A New Projection Tower

My old projection tower was a cube. My projector sat on the top, and my computer said in the bottom.

It was a pretty good solution, worked fine in California, because, well, the weather is better there.

It fell apart last week, so I had to build a new one.

  • The front, facing the screen
  • The back.

That’s what I have so far. I still need to paint it and install some equipment, and make a small stand to hold it up.

Ok, painted up and pressed into service. I need to build the base, and mount the equipment inside.

New stand
Stuff in, but not tied down yet.

I built the stand today. Reused a lot of the old stand. It’s ok, needs some paint for stability.

Monty Python and the Holy Grail is now CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS!!!

EVEN NEWER UPDATE!!!

Our neighbors are having a sleepover with what is technically known as a disaster of girls. To help them out, we’re going to show Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs this weekend.

UPDATE!!!

We don’t trust Texas not to rain on us this Saturday, so we’re delaying until next week.

So, Saturday night (April 13, 7pm), we’re hoping the weather cooperates and we can show Monty Python and the Holy Grail Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs as our entry into the new season! We hope to see you there!!

It’s only a model!!

Screen Update

I spent the last couple of weeks doing maintenance on the screen.

Last week I filled some cracks that had developed with a paintable silicon sealer, and I left that to dry.

This weekend, I painted the screen, both the flat front and I refreshed the black of the frame.

  • Painted and refurbished.

Of course, last month I had to go out and repair the left hand support for the screen. It had cracked right at the point where the support met the screen. I didn’t replace the leg, but I basically spliced it with two more 2×4’s.

On the whole, I’m very happy with the screen, and I hope that it holds up better through the next season.

New, stronger supports.

Screen Making: Texas

When we moved to Texas, we had more space to take advantage of. I decided to build a permanent screen.

  • Big Sky Theater, TX
  • New projector tower
  • Screen V1
  • V1 with screen attached
  • V2
  • V2 going up
  • V2 mounted
  • Patching and sanding
  • Finished
  • Audio upgrades
  • Old cases, new guts
  • V3
  • V3 finished
  • Broken leg
  • Close up broken leg
  • Splicing the broken leg
  • Leg splices

We’ve gone through three iterations of our screen in Texas.

V1 is made with electrical tubing, from which I hung blackout cloth as a screen. This was difficult to put up and store, but it was our biggest screen.

V2 is solid construction. I used 3/8″ ply for the screen, because I was concerned about weight. It started warping almost immediately.

V3 is 1/2″ ply, and is the biggest I’ve ever made. It’s heavy (the whole family on pulleys was needed to put it up). It’s heavy enough that in some of our more aggressive weather, one of the legs failed. I spliced a support onto it rather than replace the leg outright, and it’s a much more stable structure.

You can also see here the sound system. I installed new speakers into old cleaned up drive-in cases, and wired that up. They’re tied in using large audio jacks, so I can pull them in off season.