Review:

The Viságe screen is a so called “Black Screen” that is engineered to reject ambient light and only (within limits) reflect the light generated by your front projector. DNP Denmark AS produces the screen material, and Screen Innovations uses the material in producing the Viságe screen for the home theater market in the US.

In reality, the screen is silver in appearance. The screen specs indicate a 2.0 gain. My not so calibrated eye would have guessed 1.6 or so. The frame is beautifully manufactured with a flocked covering that minimizes any reflection. Mounting is simple, with a “Z” bracket that the screen slips over. My review sample was manufactured to 92” diagonal, which matches my existing screen. The screen is a rigid material, so the packaging is designed to protect the pre-setup frame. Setup consists of mounting the “Z” bracket (into studs, since the total weight is about 90-100 lbs. for a 92”), pulling the screen from the carton, and hanging it on the wall. The ship weight for my screen was 225 lbs., but I guessed that the packaging was slightly more than half of the total weight.

For large screens (say 110” or larger diagonal) you might need some help getting the screen out of the carton. I managed to stand the carton on end to slip the screen out by myself.

I spent a few days viewing the Viságe exclusively before doing a comparison with my current Da-Lite high power screen. My impressions were that the screen material produced slightly more vivid colors but in general I felt it was a pretty close match to my existing screen in a dark theater. After doing side by side comparisons, my initial impressions were pretty close. I’d say that the Viságe produced slightly cleaner whites (to my surprise!), as well as somewhat more intense blues. Greens were a very close match, and I would give a slight edge on reds to the Da-Lite material. Keep in mind that these were very slight differences that most people would probably not notice.

The Viságe produced some hot-spotting that I felt was noticeable, but not enough to be irritating. My wife (who really has a pretty good eye) didn’t notice the hot spotting at all, so I know it’s not going to bother the vast majority of viewers. I also noticed a slight pattern that shows up in the image, but once again my wife didn’t notice it.

The really good news that you can take from the preceding two paragraphs, is that the Viságe will not significantly detract from the presentation in a fully light controlled environment.

While the performance of the Viságe was very good in the dark, it really comes into it’s own in a ‘subdued’ light environment. My theater has a ceiling fan light fixture and widely set sconces on the back wall. I use 3 lighting ‘scenes’ that I call ‘movie’, ‘music’, and ‘reading’. ‘Movie’ is all lights off, ‘music’ has the fan light and sconces at about 25% intensity, and ‘reading’ is 100% for both. As I said above, in Movie mode, the Da-Lite and Viságe were basically neck and neck. In the ‘Music’ light, the Viságe was far and away the best. For most non-movie viewing, it would be perfectly acceptable to me to have the lights on in a subdued fashion with the Viságe. In full light or daylight, I still wouldn’t be happy, even with the Viságe. The black levels were just too washed out for me.


Below are scenes from “The Fifth Element”. I think these are a very accurate representation of the actual viewing impression I got from the screens. The Da-Lite High Power is on the left and the Viságe is on the right.

Dark Theater:



'Music' (25%) lighting:



'Reading' (100%) lighting:




The Screen Innovations Viságe does truly allow you to take a projector out of the dark with admirable results. For someone with a non-dedicated theater it could provide a very enjoyable entry into the front projection world with out having to turn the family room into a ‘cave’. For someone that does have a dedicated, fully light controlled theater room, it can provide a very watchable image for a party type environment where you want subdued light to allow other activities while watching ‘event’ type programming. People that have a rec area integrated into the theater will find this screen a near ideal compromise. In the right environment, you could trump a plasma by going ‘large’ with your front projector and the Viságe screen.

Features:

• 3.5" Wide Velvet Wrapped Contoured Frame
• 10 Different Velvet Colors to Match Any Decor
• 4 Exotic Hardwoods
• 16:9 Ratio Screen Sizes 60" to 100" by Diagonal Inch
• 4:3 Ratio Screen Sizes 60" to 100" By Diagonal Inch
• Easy Single Person Installation
• Total Depth 1.75 Inches
• Optical Front Projection
• 10 Times Higher Contrast Than Standard Front Screens
• 2 Times Brighter Images
• Compatable with All LCD, DLP and LCOS Projectors
• Lifetime Replacement Policy