[Atticus Finch]

Just a heads up in case anyone is looking for a cheap projector. I just ordered this one from Amazon, regular price $80 plus a 30% coupon. Final total for me was $60. I wanted a second one to go with the Windows FX one I got at Home Depot a few years ago and this seemed like a good deal.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B099DSMK5F?psc=1&smid=A2RTPV3PXKWHDM&ref_=chk_typ_imgToDp

 

[Aquayne]

Specs look good, way down in the fine print it shows the actual : 1280 x 720 it is good for what we do it should work great.

 

[Daphne]

You definitely have my attention! I bought a Spectral Illusion horse drawn hearse projection and want to project it at full size but know nothing about projectors other than it needs a bright bulb and I have to find a scrim ha ha!

Please report back what you think of it once you get it if you don’t mind.

 

[Atticus Finch]

Update on the projector: I got it on saturday and was able to test it out a bit over the weekend. It is predictably limited in some features that I'll outline here, but overall isn't too bad for the price. Here's a list of the things that were most notable:

1) The projected image is plenty bright and the lower resolution is fine for me. It is also fairly quiet, unlike my old Window FX projector which always sounds like it's preparing for take off.

2) There isn't an easy way to stand it on it's side for a vertical image because the power adapter is on the right side but the USB/SD card/HDMI ports are on the left. You would need something to hold it up. There is no place to attach a tripod.

3) The throw ratio isn't good. I didn't measure it out but it requires a pretty good distance to create a large projected image. That creates a problem for me because I'm working in my garage with limited space so I'm having trouble finding the right angle/direction to maintain the illusion at the scale I want.

4) The manual focus and keystone adjusters feel pretty cheaply constructed. I also thought the keystone adjuster didn't really do anything, but I didn't fiddle with it much. It only works on the horizontal axis.

5) My biggest gripe is with the actual playback of video. It can automatically loop through a set of videos but as each one plays, it briefly displays the name of the video along with a "Next" icon. I don't see a way to turn this off and it will definitely ruin the effect for the 5-10 seconds that it appears. I think the only solution to this is to use a video that's long enough to last all night without looping, or at least to minimize the loop count. I have a very short video so I will probably edit it to repeat the loop within the video itself. This is the one thing the Window FX projector does better.

All in all, I still think it's a good buy and, as long as you work within the constraints, should be a great projector for most haunt purposes.

 

[FrightRisk]

I did a long article on all these projectors a couple of years ago, but it was in the "other" forum. All of the boards inside these are made by the same company in china and several sister companies put their name on them, sometimes they change the case, sometimes they don't. The Under $100 are usually only 30-70 true lumens (your home depot unit), while the ones with the upgraded 100W LED panel are 300 as measured in my test. Nothing close to the 2000-3000 of the expensive projectors. That said, I have only seen a few uses honestly for the super bright projectors. I have a 50 lumen one from a decade ago for my singing pumpkins that uses a 50W halogen spot that costs just a few dollars to replace. The projector is hidden in a monument 4' away so is plenty bright.

Some of my other projectors are old 300 lumens. I had 2 Lightware VP800 units. The one sold under the Optima name failed. It was too much effort to fix it so I replaced it with a surpus epson with 2700 lumens. The great thing about the VP800s is that they came with 2 halogen bulb on a slider. If one burns out, you pop the front popup and just slide the slider over and keep going. Bulbs are like $4. The units are 800x600 pixels. Side by side, they are the exact same brightness as the LED units from China that use the 100W led panel. I also measured with a professional meter in a proper setting.

None of the cheap Chinese units are great, but they are good for the price. They only have keystone correction in one plane and it works just by tilting the Fresnel lens in front of the LCD. That means if you have to use it, the top and the bottom (or left and right if vertical) will be out of focus. Try not to have to large an angle to the screen. Straight on is best. Their center to edge brightness drops off sharply. But they have better resolution than some of the old surplus projectors, the colors are good and they have decent sound if you want to use that. I have a decent amount of spill light in my haunt and have a streetlight partially blocked by a tree. For anything that isn't too large or too far, 300 lumens is more than enough, even projected on a good scrim. I have the remaining Lightware on a garage door from 12` away. It is square and my videos are set to be square so there is not spillover. Anything brigher would be annoying and the light reflection would spill over to everything else. The one thing I need brighter for is the dark projections I have in an upstairs window. Going through a rear projection screen and being far away from the viewer with a lot of other light projected on the house, 300 lumens was a little dim for me.

Can't wait to hear more about your unit. I almost bought that one before I bought a used 3 LCD Epson. It is half the size of my 1080x800 Fixeover GP100. They change the models and change the names so 2 years later, the brands don't exist anymore. Mine has a 5.8" LCD and a 100W LED panel. It would be interesting to know what size the LCD is in that unit and what power the LED is. So many variables since light drops off with the square of a distance, so a short throw projector with a low wattage light, could seem the same brightness as a projector that had to be farther away to get the same sized image. Does this unit list Watts? On a sticker anywhere does it list current in Amps?

 

[FrightRisk]

Is your unit different from the pictures I've seen and the video in the reviews section? The guy who unboxed his clearly shows a brass colored female tripod hole on the bottom.

 

[Atticus Finch]

Can't wait to hear more about your unit. I almost bought that one before I bought a used 3 LCD Epson. It is half the size of my 1080x800 Fixeover GP100. They change the models and change the names so 2 years later, the brands don't exist anymore. Mine has a 5.8" LCD and a 100W LED panel. It would be interesting to know what size the LCD is in that unit and what power the LED is. So many variables since light drops off with the square of a distance, so a short throw projector with a low wattage light, could seem the same brightness as a projector that had to be farther away to get the same sized image. Does this unit list Watts? On a sticker anywhere does it list current in Amps?

Thanks for posting all the great info! I don't know much about projectors so this is a helpful reference. There's no mention of wattage but the sticker on the bottom says 1.0A input.

 

[Atticus Finch]

Is your unit different from the pictures I've seen and the video in the reviews section? The guy who unboxed his clearly shows a brass colored female tripod hole on the bottom.

It is the same as the one in the unboxing video. It does have the tripod mounting hole which I didn't notice at first but when I mentioned that before I was referring to anywhere on the side for a vertical mount.

 

[jfmoore]

I did a long article on all these projectors a couple of years ago, but it was in the "other" forum. All of the boards inside these are made by the same company in china and several sister companies put their name on them, sometimes they change the case, sometimes they don't. The Under $100 are usually only 30-70 true lumens (your home depot unit), while the ones with the upgraded 100W LED panel are 300 as measured in my test. Nothing close to the 2000-3000 of the expensive projectors. That said, I have only seen a few uses honestly for the super bright projectors. I have a 50 lumen one from a decade ago for my singing pumpkins that uses a 50W halogen spot that costs just a few dollars to replace. The projector is hidden in a monument 4' away so is plenty bright.

Some of my other projectors are old 300 lumens. I had 2 Lightware VP800 units. The one sold under the Optima name failed. It was too much effort to fix it so I replaced it with a surpus epson with 2700 lumens. The great thing about the VP800s is that they came with 2 halogen bulb on a slider. If one burns out, you pop the front popup and just slide the slider over and keep going. Bulbs are like $4. The units are 800x600 pixels. Side by side, they are the exact same brightness as the LED units from China that use the 100W led panel. I also measured with a professional meter in a proper setting.

None of the cheap Chinese units are great, but they are good for the price. They only have keystone correction in one plane and it works just by tilting the Fresnel lens in front of the LCD. That means if you have to use it, the top and the bottom (or left and right if vertical) will be out of focus. Try not to have to large an angle to the screen. Straight on is best. Their center to edge brightness drops off sharply. But they have better resolution than some of the old surplus projectors, the colors are good and they have decent sound if you want to use that. I have a decent amount of spill light in my haunt and have a streetlight partially blocked by a tree. For anything that isn't too large or too far, 300 lumens is more than enough, even projected on a good scrim. I have the remaining Lightware on a garage door from 12` away. It is square and my videos are set to be square so there is not spillover. Anything brigher would be annoying and the light reflection would spill over to everything else. The one thing I need brighter for is the dark projections I have in an upstairs window. Going through a rear projection screen and being far away from the viewer with a lot of other light projected on the house, 300 lumens was a little dim for me.

Can't wait to hear more about your unit. I almost bought that one before I bought a used 3 LCD Epson. It is half the size of my 1080x800 Fixeover GP100. They change the models and change the names so 2 years later, the brands don't exist anymore. Mine has a 5.8" LCD and a 100W LED panel. It would be interesting to know what size the LCD is in that unit and what power the LED is. So many variables since light drops off with the square of a distance, so a short throw projector with a low wattage light, could seem the same brightness as a projector that had to be farther away to get the same sized image. Does this unit list Watts? On a sticker anywhere does it list current in Amps?

Is that article still available anywhere?

 

[Daphne]

I would also be interested in the article, I need to pull the trigger on a projector and scrim pretty quick to get it in time for this Halloween and I haven't had time for research yet compliments of some new props that aren't coming together as quickly as hoped. The Spectral Illusion video is only 50 seconds long so showing the title each time would be a problem considering it should play it back for probably 3.5 hours nonstop.

 

[Daphne]

Update on the projector: I got it on saturday and was able to test it out a bit over the weekend. It is predictably limited in some features that I'll outline here, but overall isn't too bad for the price. Here's a list of the things that were most notable:

1) The projected image is plenty bright and the lower resolution is fine for me. It is also fairly quiet, unlike my old Window FX projector which always sounds like it's preparing for take off.

2) There isn't an easy way to stand it on it's side for a vertical image because the power adapter is on the right side but the USB/SD card/HDMI ports are on the left. You would need something to hold it up. There is no place to attach a tripod.

3) The throw ratio isn't good. I didn't measure it out but it requires a pretty good distance to create a large projected image. That creates a problem for me because I'm working in my garage with limited space so I'm having trouble finding the right angle/direction to maintain the illusion at the scale I want.

4) The manual focus and keystone adjusters feel pretty cheaply constructed. I also thought the keystone adjuster didn't really do anything, but I didn't fiddle with it much. It only works on the horizontal axis.

5) My biggest gripe is with the actual playback of video. It can automatically loop through a set of videos but as each one plays, it briefly displays the name of the video along with a "Next" icon. I don't see a way to turn this off and it will definitely ruin the effect for the 5-10 seconds that it appears. I think the only solution to this is to use a video that's long enough to last all night without looping, or at least to minimize the loop count. I have a very short video so I will probably edit it to repeat the loop within the video itself. This is the one thing the Window FX projector does better.

All in all, I still think it's a good buy and, as long as you work within the constraints, should be a great projector for most haunt purposes.

After reading a bunch on projectors, I can honestly say I am considerably dumber than when I started. The projector you purchased sounds like its major shortcomings are the throw ratio and name/icons/info between videos. I'm curious at what distance it works well? From what I am finding, I can use a long throw although I'm not entirely sure what distance that is. Mine will be in my driveway shooting at a scrim so I don't have the limitations you do in a tight space. Sorry you are having that problem. With regards to the stuff between videos, if you used a media player like the Micca Speck, would that automatically loop where you wouldn't see anything but video? You indicated it is pretty bright but is what you are projecting bright? Obviously a lot of what we are projecting may be fairly dark, I know mine is.

 

[jfmoore]

The cheap LED projector is a tough nut to crack for two reasons: 1. There are so many of them, and 2. Most are junk. However, not all are junk. Are you going to get one as good as a $3k one for < $200? No, but you can get one that is completely serviceable for your hollusion project, IMHO. Last year, I got lucky and got a good one after a lot of looking, but that's the exception. Usually, you have to be willing to send a couple of junkers back. The one I got was a GP100Plus at a claimed 3500 lumens, native 1200x800, and it is very bright as these things go. A decent projector for about $90.

Then, just a week ago, I tried one of the cheap ones that seemed to have good specs. Was like $80 after the coupon. Total junk. Claimed 9800 lumens (yeah, I know), but wasn't half as bright as my other one, so I couldn't wait to get it back in the box and return it. Today, I ordered the one below, and I think it may be okay, but I will let you know. It is a good deal at about $100, provided that it is as least as bright as my GP100. Supposedly 1080P native, but we'll see. Here's hoping.

Amazon.com

 

[Daphne]

I got an email notification that jfmoore replied to this discussing about LED projectors. The email won't show the whole message and it isn't showing up here. Anyone else see the full response? I found one that may not be complete trash, it probably is, they all seem to be.... I'm trying to decide whether to just get the one Attitucus Finch got or maybe this? https://www.bestbuy.com/site/vankyo...-mini-projector-white/6424701.p?skuId=6424701

 

[RoxyBlue]

I got an email notification that jfmoore replied to this discussing about LED projectors. The email won't show the whole message and it isn't showing up here. Anyone else see the full response? I found one that may not be complete trash, it probably is, they all seem to be.... I'm trying to decide whether to just get the one Attitucus Finch got or maybe this? https://www.bestbuy.com/site/vankyo...-mini-projector-white/6424701.p?skuId=6424701

Issue has been fixed so you can see his post now.

 

[Daphne]

Issue has been fixed so you can see his post now.

Thank you! You’re awesome!

 

[Daphne]

Atticus, did you notice that as your projection looped and there was a dark part that the light still illuminated a giant rectangular spot that stayed dimly lit? I bought a projector today and noticed that. You don’t notice it while the projection is playing but in the dead space at the beginning and end there it is. Assuming that would be minimized with a more translucent scrim.

 

[jfmoore]

Okay, Crenova projector arrived. See above. Looks to be bright enough, but too early to tell. Keystone adjustment is frozen maxed out and will not move, so impossible to test. One support phone number is outgoing only. The other is answered by a 3rd party, and it is a terrible line. Probably in Bangladesh. So I do not know if they got the correct Amazon order number or my correct email address. Also, Amazon says "unusual activity" in their reviews, so restricting to verified purchases only. That would have been good to know BEFORE I bought it, Amazon! Anyway, not yet allowing me to review, or I would have put this there, as well. I don't have time to mess around, so if I do not hear immediately, I will see what Amazon will do.

I'll keep you posted.

 

[jfmoore]

Phone number Crenova gave didn't work so tried second phone number. Got a person with a terrible connection. They did follow up with a prompt email, though, but it was the "We're sorry, please provide photos, videos, more info, etc." and I didn't have time for that mess, so I contacted Amazon and arranged a return. I am satisfied that this unit, which I think was shipped by Crenova, was a return, because the box had been opened, the remote had batteries already in it, and the unit did not work.

So, since it seemed to be bright enough, I ordered one of their BL-76 models (red) that is shipped by Amazon and will arrive in 2 days, hopefully with none of that previously returned unit nonsense. I'm ordering this one primarily because it will arrive quickly, and a direct replacement would require another week, but there are advantages to this one, like it has manual buttons instead of the insanely bright yet hard to read touch panel. In any event, it's how I had to go, and I will update here when I get it.

 

[jfmoore]

Update on Crenova projector and customer service...

I was very much surprised that a Crenova support person, Michael, responded very quickly and offered to have Amazon investigate as to how the incident happened and also to replace the unit. So, I have to say that, due to my time pressures, I may have overreacted a bit and just assumed that I would get poor service.

On the BL76 unit: It is a beautiful machine that seems to be plenty bright, but I haven't really tested it much yet. At this point, I believe that it is worth the current price of about $100 after the coupon. I will post more after I do more testing.

 

[jfmoore]

Update 2 on Crenova projector and service...

It turned out that the company acted promptly, courteously, and professionally in fixing the problem with the first projector.

As to the BL76, if you are needing a bright projector for Halloween, you could do a lot worse than this one, and it may take you many tries to get one as good for the price, which is right at $100 after coupon but before tax. Like the fellow who fell off of a 10 story building said on the way down, "So far, so good!" It is a full-sized projector, though, and not a mini, but then I don't think any of the minis can rival the larger unites as to picture quality and brightness, but that's just my opinion.