Screen Innovations: Visage Hi-Contrast Screen - Summary
-Art Feierman 2/17/2006
The Visage by Screen Innovations is, to my knowledge, a pretty unique screen, that has numerous applications for both home viewing and business/commercial environments.
Pros
- Rejects a good deal of ambient light from above/below, left and right sides, allowing reasonable viewing where other screens are completely inadequate
- Roll off of screen brightness: As viewer moves off angle from the screen, roll off seems comparable with lower contrast screens, with similar or slightly higher gains. Translation, off angle viewing is better than I have seen on some other high gain screens, which do not reject ambient light quite as well.
- Construction appears to be very good. The 60" diagonal 16:9 screen I received came pre-assembled and was shipped in a wooden crate, and arrived completely unscathed. (I do not know if much larger screens are shipped pre-assembled, but I suspect not).
- The Visage, in conjunction with a low power projector, and the right environment may make a better solution than a high power projector with a more traditional screen surface.
Cons
- Screen is very expensive compared to most othe high gain screens
- Like other high gain screens while it rejects side lighting, it is more susceptable to lighting behind the projection source.
The commercial applications for this screen are clear, bright boardrooms or trade show floors immediately come to mind.
In the home, the Visage may be the best solution for good viewing in rooms that cannot be fully darkened.
A last note. In my own home theater, with all the motorized shades closed, I still have modest room lighting coming in. I viewed some dark scenes from Lord of the Rings, on the Visage, that turned out to look pretty good. By comparison, the same scene (at the same overall size), on my 1.3 gain Firehawk, lost virtually all detail in the darker areas. In other words, My room, as such, still has too much light in the daytime for watching dark scenes with a traditional high contrast screen like the Firehawk, but the Screen Innovations Visage makes those scenes very watchable, however still not as good as having a properly dark room.
