The Projector Screen Experts at Big Screen Center put together a terrific article on choosing the right projector screen size for a room. The article goes into detail about the math involved selecting a projector screen that is proportionate to the room.

Feel free to browse the full text article on Squidoo.com: How to Pick the Right Projector Screen Size

Three Keys to the Right Screen Size

1. Projector Native Resolution lets you know which aspect ratio to select for your screen . What is the native resolution of the projector that you have?
2. Ceiling Height allows you to determine the screen height that will fit gracefully into a room. What is the ceiling height of the room that you are outfitting?
3. Screen Distance to Audience. The people sitting farthest away from the screen determine the minimum screen width. A screen should be at least as wide as 1/6 of the distance between the screen and the viewer farthest from the screen. How far away will the viewer be sitting?

With answers to these questions, you can estimate an appropriate screen size for a given room.

First, we want to look at the native resolution (aspect ratio) of the projector being used in the room. This will help you determine what screen format you should use. Most all projectors nowadays will do both 4:3 and 16:9 aspect ratios. Projectors with 16:9 aspect ratio, like these available at Big Screen Center, are designed for playing High Def movies in home theater settings.

As shown below, a projector with a native 16:9 aspect ratio can letterbox to show a smaller image in 4:3 format. You will want to go by the native aspect ratio in order to get the biggest and best picture.

Second, we will want to look at the ceiling height in the room. A screen should be at least 1 ft. down from the ceiling and 3 ft. up from the floor. For example, in an 8 ft. room, a screen should be 4 ft. high at the most. If the room has a slanted ceiling, the screen should be placed at least 1 ft below the ceiling at the point where the screen is going to be installed. This rule of thumb gives you a screen that is gracefully proportionate to the wall and the room. This is especially true for classrooms, boardrooms, and conference rooms where people will be sitting in front of one another.

If you are mounting your projector to a central location on the ceiling, you want to mount the projector so that it is even with the top of the the screen. Now this rule of thumb is for a maximum screen size. It is OK to go smaller. People tend to focus on what they can see in the center of their field of vision. A person’s gaze tends to travel from one portion of the screen to the next when the screen is too big (or the person is sitting too close) to see it all at once. You don’t want your audience to get tennis neck.

Finally, we need to look at the distance the audience will be sitting from the screen. If the screen is bigger, people can see it from further away. For auditoriums, conference, and boardrooms the width of the screen should be no less that 1/6 the distance of the farthest spectator in the audience. For example if the back row of an auditorium is 48 ft. away then the width of the screen should be at least 8 ft. wide. This rule of thumb is for minimum screen size. It is OK to go larger. The important thing is to get a screen that is large enough for the audience in the back row to view comfortably.

Enjoying the Finished Installation Makes It All Worth While

Photo Courtesy of Epson and CruchGear.com

Example: Applying the Projector Screen Size Rules of Thumb

Projector Resolution. I will pretend I have a Panasonic PT-AE2000U projector, 16:9 aspect ratio for playing Hi-Def movies in a home theater. That means I should use a 16:9 HDTV format screen to get the biggest and best picture.

Ceiling Height. My ceilings are 8 ft. high. So my screen should be 48 in. high at the most. That means the largest screen I can fit in my small home theater is 92 in. diagonal 16:9 HDTV format (45 in. H x 80 in W).

Distance from Screen to Audience. If I prefer a smaller screen, the rule of thumb that screen width is based on the distance between viewer and screen offers some guidance. For example, if I set up the couch 10 ft. or 120 in. away, then the screen should be at least 20 in. wide (1/6 of 120 in.). That means a screen that is anywhere between 20 in. and 80 in. wide with a 16:9 aspect ratio will fit in my home theater.

Remember these rules are just a guide. It is important to have a clear idea of how the screen will fit with architectural features at the installation site. Discussing the screen installation with a knowledgeable professional like the experts at Big Screen Center (1-800-314-8955) may help clarify details of the the project.

Projector Screens Can Harmonize with Architectural Features - Like Stained Glass Windows

Photo Courtesy of recycledtoys.wordpress.com/

For example, a screen is the right size by the numbers might overlap some architectural feature like a window or door frame. In this case, it really helps to plan your purchase with someone who knows all the right questions to ask up front. Knowing your screen will be the right size the first time can save money and time up front.

We had a customer call in recently who had planned to install a screen between two windows but had not included the width of the window frame in his measurement of the distance between the two windows. The measurement was 80″ from windowpane to windowpane. The window frames were 2″ wide. That means that a 60″ x 80″ screen would have the viewing area exactly flush with the glass of the windows completely hide the window frames on both sides.

That’s OK for a manual or electric screen mounted to hang in front of the window frames. However a fixed frame screen designed to mount flush to the wall would be crowded out of position by the window frames. Sometimes it helps to work with a professional.

Big Screens Come in Small - And Long - Packages

Photo Courtesy of HomeTheaterBlog.com

It would be worthwhile to ask your sales rep about the size of the shipping carton the screen arrives in. Once you know the carton measurements, before you buy, check to make sure the screen carton will fit through the door into the room where it will be installed. For example, one reason the 108″ LCD television never caught on is because it is too large to fit through the doorway of a conventional house and turn down a 3′ hallway.

Sharp 108″ LCD Television - Towering over the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas

Photo courtesy of Sharp and Foxnews.com

Measure any doorways, hallways, stairwells that the projector screen carton would have to pass through from the place it leaves the delivery truck to the place it should be installed. Do your best to measure or imagine how the carton would fit through. If the package is too long to fit through the door and around all the corners, check to see if there is a window that can open to let it through. Or get creative. As a last resort, it may be appropriate to consider a smaller size.

So! You want to know the real difference in the top of the pile video formats? Well, that’s what this little slice of wisdom is hopefully going to do. When it comes to these kinds of things, we know what we’re talking about. No, really - we do. Without further ado, here’s how it all started:

Back in the good old days of the late 1960s, there started in Japan a newfangled theory that television broadcasts could look better than the crummy old sets we’d all been using since the early days of color television. Improvements had been made - color reproduction, contrast, sharpness were all greatly improved by the introduction of high quality digital components that were simply better than their old analog counterparts. But that hadn’t changed the fact that the CRT (cathode ray tube) hadn’t really changed all that much. At the same time, it was well established that a higher quality picture tube was quite feasible. Some bright scientist somewhere said “HEY! What if we made a television that could do the same thing as a computer monitor?” And so, the quest for high definition television was begun.

Experiments with HDTV had been tried before - England and France had both experimented with higher definition broadcasts in the 1940s, Japan had tried in the 1960s and 1970s, and all of them eventually abandoned the idea. The experiment was lackluster at best and an outright failure at worst. Because high definition uses more bandwidth than a normal broadcast, there’s a sacrifice - you can have either high quality visuals OR lots of channels in over the air broadcasts…but not both. There was, however, some good. By the early 1980s, standards such as the formats that would later become standard HDTV were agreed upon. With the advent of digital broadcasting in the form of satellite and cable services, the early fears of broadcast limitations were more or less dissolved. Digital signals have a much higher capacity allowing TV watchers to have their cake and eat it, too. In addition, public interest was becoming sparked by the prospects of a higher quality television.

Around 1997, the first 480p/720p televisions went on sale to the general public in the USA. Though extremely expensive at first, these first generation TVs made a great impression based on their high quality picture. During this period, there was also an influx of EDTV sets, which were able to display at 480p only. These sets have largely been phased out in favor of newer 720p/1080i capable screens, but they are still occasionally seen in second hand stores, yard sales, and online.

The main problem was the fact that at first, there was nothing to use with the new HDTV screens! High definition broadcasting was an entirely new concept in the USA, and although DVD players have higher quality images than VHS tapes, the max resolution of a DVD player is only 800 pixels by 600. You could get an up scaling DVD player, but they were pricey. As if that weren’t frustrating enough, there was also a vigorous debate over how to get the best quality of signal out of the attached devices - analog connections or digital. The benefits and disadvantages of these could fill their own article (hint, hint..) but the basic argument boils down to the fact that digital doesn’t lose signal quality and analog is much cheaper to use.

These days, with the introduction of the new (and pricey) 1080p screens and truly high definition formats such as Blu-Ray and HD-DVD, the high definition television has come into its own. It’s now possible to get a high quality high definition screen for around $800-$1000, or a similar quality projector that can output an extremely large image (typically, 100”+). The issues initially encountered are now far removed, and in many cases outright eliminated.