Screen Geometry and Optics
Square-shaped screens used for overhead projectors sometimes double as projection screens for digital projectors in meeting rooms, where space is scarce and multiple screens can seem redundant. These screens have an aspect ratio of 1:1 by definition. Other popular aspect ratios include 4:3 and a widescreen ratio of 16:9, which are often used as dedicated data projection and home cinema use, respectively.
Most image sources are designed to project a perfectly rectangular image on a flat screen. If the audience stays relatively close to the projector, a curved screen may be used instead without visible distortion in the image geometry. Viewers closer or farther away will see a pincushion or barrel distortion, and the curved nature of the screen will become apparent when viewed off-axis.
Read more about this topic: Projection Screen
Famous quotes containing the words screen and/or geometry:
“Every obstruction of the course of justice,—is a door opened to betray society, and bereave us of those blessings which it has in view.... It is a strange way of doing honour to God, to screen actions which are a disgrace to humanity.”
—Laurence Sterne (1713–1768)
“The geometry of landscape and situation seems to create its own systems of time, the sense of a dynamic element which is cinematising the events of the canvas, translating a posture or ceremony into dynamic terms. The greatest movie of the 20th century is the Mona Lisa, just as the greatest novel is Gray’s Anatomy.”
—J.G. (James Graham)