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Exclusive: New Pictures of Projected Images by Syndiant’s 720p LCOS Panel
I asked my old company Syndiant if I could take some high-resolution photos of their new SYL2271 720P LCOS panel and they agreed. Below are pictures I took with an 18 megapixel DSLR. With some cropping due to the camera being 3:2 versus HD 16:9), there are about 13 camera pixels per for each pixel in the projected image).
To be fair, the optics Syndiant was using were clearly “prototype” and not specifically designed for Syndiant’s 720p panel. In fact, the optics were designed for a larger 720p panel and thus using the smaller Syndiant SYL2271 was pushing the optics as evident from some of the chroma aberrations and the overall ability to sharply focus the image. So these images should be worse that what will be seen in the final products. Also the illumination of the panel in the prototype projector was not uniform which causes some color variation across the white test pattern.
Click on the images below to see the full images. Note if you view it at less than 100% you may see aliasing due to scaling of the 1 pixel wide horizontal and vertical lines. So make sure you are looking at it at 100% (you may have to click on the + magnifying cursor on your browser to do so).
If you are not used to seeing such large pictures of projected images you will see things that are not visible to the naked eye when viewing them “live.” Effectively, it is like looking at the projected images with a magnifying glass.
- Syndiant 720P Text Pattern Projected Image
Below is a picture I like because it has a lot of color, detail, and skin tones.
- SYL2271 Projected Image of Elf
The picture below is one I took in York England. If you look at the image at 100% in the left hand tower you can guy-wires holding up the flag pole and the spokes in Ferris Wheel behind the tower. The clouds demonstrate the ability to do smooth shading
Below is the 720p resolution test pattern I used for the first image:
good looking photos Karl.
if Syndiant could take care of the Saturation on the red and cyan the images would look a lot better. (-20 on both)
greens look off. to much cyan.
has a slight pincushion.
you need to make a note on the test pattern image. when i viewed it in Photoshop’s B&W. i had to reset the sliders to 50. if i didn’t, i got contrast differences in the lines. Or use the Channel Mixer.
as for the cyan shading running through the Test Pattern. any ideas as to why that is happening?
it looks to be panel problem.
all in all – good looking photos
There is no problem the LCOS projectors having very saturate colors using LEDs. It is impossible to judge colors from a a photograph of a projected image; the camera alone introduces many variables.
I didn’t find there to be any noticeable pincushion but these are “prototype” optics anyway and nothing like what would be used in production.
Not sure if I follow your suggestion on Photoshop and what slider you set to 50. Much of the “contrast loss” in the light should be attributed to the optics. They are for a much larger 720p panel so it is really pushing them to work with much smaller pixels.
I’m pretty sure the Cyan shading is from the illumination optics and not the panel. As this is field sequential color there really isn’t much of a way for the panel to cause this. The projector they were using was one that had be “re-purposed” and was hand put together with some clamps for the panel. They have several companies working on “production” optics but none of them were in a finished state. The purpose of the photos was to show the working panel and in particular is resolution.
in Photoshop editing program there are 2 ways to get to a Black and White image.
using the B&W Adjustment Layer has an auto settings. when i 1st opened up the Adjustment Layer the lines were different shades of black. after adjusting the sliders to 50 all the lines had the same contrast of black.
when using a straight line to compare the straightness of the lines in the image. i got some pincushion.
by the way – very nice image of Syndiant’s light engine.
http://www.picoprojector-info.com/video-interview-syndiants-vp-sales-and-marketing-keith-lewis
How severe is the “rainbow” effect on that panel? is getting better?, what happened with the old syndiant LCOS panels? LED lightning is not supposed to correct those problems?
thanks
The field sequential color (FSC) color breakup or “rainbow effect” is significantly improved with Syndiant’s 720p device. The older Syndiant panels typically were run at 240 fields or 180 fields per second but the new 720p design is capable of running at greater than 600 fields per second while at the same time having higher light-on time (there are major improvements in the drive method on the 720p). The 720p device/ASIC also supports a white field that both boosts brightness and reduces the the effect. LED lighting alone does not change the effect, but it enables reduction in the effect. LEDs allow you to run higher frame rates without loosing a significant amount of light. Additionally the LED colors are so saturated that you have some headroom to add white field(s) and still have reasonably well saturated colors.