Projection System Suggestions

[jpetersen]

Hey y'all,

I am asking for a bit of advice about our church's projection systems. They hired me a few months ago to put song lyrics on a screen for the Praise Team. Since then, it has kind of snowballed (meaning as we've gone along we've built up speed and grown a lot). Now, we have a new projector, larger screen, a few confidence (stage) monitors, and I'd like to address our screen and projector problems. Right now, we have a portable Da-Lite tripod screen that I have to set up every week. It sits at the front of the Sanctuary. The projector goes in between the piano and organ player thingy. The portable screen is a pain because it is never straight and looks a bit unprofessional. I;d like to mount an electric screen on the wall. The issue is, we've got no wall to mount it on. At the front of the Sanctuary, there is a HUGE pipe organ, front and center. Everything else is windows. Makes it a bit difficult. The ceiling is super high, so mounting it directly to the ceiling is a bit out of the question, because everyone would end up looking straight up. I was thinking, if I could mount an electric screen to a few gearmotors and attach those to the ceiling, and just roll down the screen to a more reasonable height, that might work. Any comments, criticisms, or other ideas? Anything would be helpful.

Thanks,

Jeremy

[[Admin] osborn4]

We had our screen designed to drop the extra 8 feet. Actually there are 8-9 feet of black above the screen, all lowered by the screen motor.

If you go to our web site, http://www.miltonsdb.org and view the Quick Tour on the bottom on the bottom row, you can see some shots of the screen in action about 1:20 in.

And yes, it is hanging down in front of some stained glass. And yes, we heard complaints for quite a while about that.

So we eased in to using the screen, raising and lowering it as needed. But because of the lenght of the screen, it takes about 18 seconds to lower, a fact you're very aware of as the pastor is winding up a prayer and the worship set is about to start.

Also, I took a picture of the stained class from the perspective of the projector and used it for fill for a while. But I overheard one of the main complainers saying "And they think they can fool us with that picture..." I wasn't trying to fool anyone. I was trying to find a compromise.

But over the years, we added graphic support to more and more service elements until now we just leave it down.

Any yes, it really is too high for the first several rows of pews.

So good luck. It can be done.

[tdangelo]

An electric roll down screen could work depending on your celing height and the maximum vertical height roll-down screen available. What I am not crazy about with a roll down is that it will block more of your upstage decor (pipes from organ and whatever) that is necessary for the projected image. For example, assume the following scenario:

Celing Height 30'
Desired projected image height 9'
Desired projected image width 16'
Desired projected image height off (base) floor 9'

In this scenario your roll down screen will have the dimension of 16' horizontal by 21' vertical with only a 9' high image on the 21' vertical surface. 12' of vertical screen space will be unused and will block decor. Not very appealing.

If the ceiling height is available I would consider hanging a 12' or so header valance at the ceiling.

I would then rig a 9' V x 16' H screen on a rigid frame so that it can be hidden behind the header valance when not needed and also have the ability to have the screen be lowered in on two aircraft cables to a "show trim position" when needed. This solution provides a way that no unused screen height is blocking the upstage decor. The only blockage will have your projected image on it. When you are done with the projection, the screen can fly out of the way back into a hidden position.

These dimensions are just an example. Your room dimensions would need to be examined to see what works best for you. Do you have any photos? Any opportunity to go rear projection?