A projector cannot project black. Every black you see is light the surface failed to absorb, plus whatever the space hands back. Answer the questions and the preview runs that arithmetic live, against a standard matte white screen.
There is no gain value to enter, because these surfaces do not work on one. Gain belongs to screens that push light back toward the center seat and lose it at the sides; this range holds an even hemisphere instead. So rather than a gain figure, take the estimated output for your own scenario: image white, black floor and on-screen contrast, for your projector in your space.
Optional starting points, not a requirement: every one of them just sets the answers below, and everything stays editable after.
Move across a chart to read it · click to pin the reading, and it stays live while you change the scenario
These scopes measure the simulated screen, not the signal going into the projector: the sRGB re-encoding of modeled screen luminance at the reference seat, sampled on a grid rather than every pixel. Read them comparatively, not as a calibration report. Real imagers, real optics and real venues carry the tolerances stated above, so treat differences of a point or two as noise and look instead at the shape of the change.
These figures size the picture the projector throws, not the screen it lands on. The two are assumed equal until you say otherwise: the physical surface gets its own size in the placement panel below, where the image can also sit smaller, larger, turned or off axis on it.
Projected pixels have no gaps. An imager lays them edge to edge, so a projected 2 mm pitch reads smoother than an LED wall of the same pitch, where the dark gap between emitters is part of the picture.
Blending does not add resolution. Two projectors sharing a 20% band paint the same physical pixels twice inside it, so the surface gets one tile’s density, never the array’s pixel sum. Stacking adds none at all: aligned projectors put the same pixel on the same spot, which buys light, not detail.
Distance does the rest. The eye resolves roughly one arcminute, so pixel structure disappears at about 3.4 meters per millimeter of pitch. Inside about one meter per millimeter, the grid is part of the image. For camera work judge it by the sensor instead: a camera framed on part of the surface magnifies the pitch by its crop, and a fine pitch is what keeps moiré and visible structure out of the plate.
Drag a zone to move it, pull a handle to resize it, and the arithmetic follows the placement. Zones on the same layer blend, so the pair ramps down to one tile’s worth of light and the band is governed by the dimmer of the two. Put a zone on a second layer and it stacks instead, adding its light on top. The preview follows all of it: where nothing is aimed the image goes dark, and where the light differs the picture does too. Pop this panel out to work at full size.
This one wants room. Popped out it becomes a floating, resizable window, and the stage gets big enough to place projectors properly.
This code carries the layout and the whole scenario around it: the surface, the venue, the projectors and every zone you have placed. Copy it somewhere safe, a note or an email to yourself, and paste it back here whenever you want this exact setup again.
Two different rectangles live on this page: the projection surface, the physical screen that arrives on the truck, and the projection image, the light your projector throws at it. Everywhere else they are the same rectangle. Here they part company: give the surface its own size, then move, scale, turn or keystone the image on it. The preview, the arithmetic and the seed all follow.
Mass is the surface alone at 254.97 g/m². Reinforced edges, eyelets, grommets, velcro, pockets, bonded hems, the frame hardware and the packaging each have to be accounted for individually, so the weight of the finished screen system is always this figure plus the build we agree with you.
Tension travel is the relaxation a rigid frame has to be able to take up: 0.74% along the run and 0.46% across it. Permanent installations are usually re-tensioned once in the first four to six months, depending on the conditions the surface is kept in, and hold after that. Shape travel is the elastic give at working tension, which is what lets a curve be pulled true instead of forced.
The roll is a working estimate for a loose wrap on a 100 mm core, and packing follows what actually ships rather than what the material allows. Up to a 2.4 m tube it crates as one skid and travels by courier or ordinary pallet freight. Up to 5.8 m it is a long-load crate, so road freight or a 20 ft container. Above that the surface is accordion folded down to a 2.4 m panel over a padded core and rolled from there, with a slip sheet at every turn and no hard creases. On site, hang it and let it relax for a day or two before final tension: the elastic give in the material is what takes fold marks out. The full build data covers strength, effects, care and compliance.
Seed
Ordering does not need a visit. Send the seed and we come back with a quotation, a drawing and a lead time, priced against the finished size, the edge and the fixing. If you would rather see it working first, the demo facility is in Hollywood and we can also arrange a demo around your own project.
The preview is a physical model, not a datasheet: image white is what the projector’s lumens come to over the area of the surface once the material has taken its share, the black floor adds the projector’s own leak to the light your space returns. These surfaces carry no gain figure, so the output here is the answer to your scenario rather than a number scaled off a laboratory constant. Exposure is fixed, so a brighter projector reads as a brighter image and the unlit surface holds still. Real venues carry surprises. Final selection is confirmed with independently measured data and a demo.
The configurator is a work in progress, offered as a concept: a way to sketch what could be created with this technology in your setting, not a finished engineering tool. Errors and rough edges are possible. If you find one, or have a suggestion, write to info@qualia-forge.com and we will fold it in.
The notes that appear when you rest the pointer on a control are the short version. The long version is a guide of its own: how brightness, black and blending actually behave, why a darker surface wins in a brighter space, and what the light in your venue is doing behind your back. About twenty minutes, no prior projection experience assumed.