I thought this would be the best place to post this link that was sent to me

www.lumenlab.com

I read through some of the forum posts on their site and was really impressed by the quality of some of the images they were producing on their own homemade projectors. For a fraction of what an actual commercial projector costs (upwards of 5000 $ I hear) one can produce their own quality one. I might think of buying the guide from the website. It says on their website that building a descent one costs 400$ with new components and all.

This post has been edited by microscopic^earthling: Oct 28 2005, 04:04 AM

Some images taken from the site (unretouched they claim)

Gladiator


First Person Shooter 9Im gusseing Metroid?)


LOTR


The Matrix


The Shining

Hi golgothurteen,

they mention: "The Lumenlab DIY 15" Projector is a REAL projector with a high quality XGA LCD panel, a powerful Metal Halide lamp and REAL projection optics. The so-called projection TV kits are simply a cheap fresnel lens that you put in front of your television; an image is projected, but not a watchable one".

It's definitely not worth paying for "their" info ... I've seen drawings/schematics for these types on some forums a few years ago.

I've seen the Fresnel+TV kits on an online TV tech show, and the "quality" was worthless. These guys say they use proper optics etc. What they are doing is basically projecting a bright lamp through a normal LCD (rather than one on a chip) and then using the lens to focus the image crisply on a wall/sheet.

I remember the forum thread I read mentioning problems of heat being the main issue .. and one guy built a bunch of fans in his.

All of these sites sell "howto's" that should really be free .. and they are just there to then sell their own wares!

Other options I read about include the use of a cheap OHP with an LCD display, and both transmissive & reflective LCDs ...

Kam.

Thanks for the info kam. I actually just googled the pdf guide last night and got it for free. You might be right about the heating arrangement. It just shows that you have to install a mini fan on the bulb. Might damage the other components. Hopefully others will put inut on this if they have any experiences, etc.

Golgothurteen - would you care to share the googled link with me.. not here, of course but PM me..

Thanks,
m^e

PM sent

golgothurteen, the screenshots you have found show that the particular projectors made work well. However, how long did it take them to perfect it to such a high quality?

PS: Your signature would kill a sufferer of epilepsy. Can you tone it down a little?

Hey, that's pretty cool...I'd definately do something like that to same some dough.

Well here in pretty old England, projectors can be as cheap as £140. At my school, we recently became a Maths and Computing College (status), Leading Edge Mentor and several other things. They brought in over a quarter of a million british sterling in funding. So, now every classroom has an interactive whiteboard and projector. The projectors only cost £140 each. And before anybody says that it was only that price because it was due to bulk buy, such specialised items can not be bulk baught, nor do schools get discounts on them.

So it could cost you something from $250-600 ??? Still expensive, you can do that for $5 (saw it on Brainiac, but quality sucked big time )

This free guide shows you how to make one from an old overheadprojector. Ok, it's bulky, but it works too (and if you're lucky you could make it for less than $100 )