What Is the Right Projector Offset for Your Golf Simulator Setup?
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Speaking of the golf simulator, understanding and compensating for projector offset is crucial to ensure that the projected image aligns correctly with the desired viewing area.
What Is Projector Offset
Projector offset, presented as a percentage, refers to the distance between the center of the lens to the bottom of the image when placing the projector on a table or the top of the image when mounting the projecting from a ceiling. Golf simulator setups usually go with overhead-mounted projectors installed upside down, and the larger the offset, the taller ceiling of your golf simulator should be.
The Right Projector Offset for Golf Simulator
You might have to mount your projector in a place where the projected image will be coming into the impact screen at an angle. Take a room where the ceiling is 9 ft height and enclosure is 7.7 ft height as an example. If you project a 4:3 image in 151 inches with 91” in height and 121” in width in your golf simulator, you can see that a projector offset between 100% and 110% works very well. With an offset of more than 115%, you may need to tilt the projector upwards with 11.5 degree and more.
When you tilt a projector, you change the shape of the image into a trapezoid instead of a rectangle. Then you have to go with vertical keystone to get an image that fits properly on your screen. This may compromise brightness and resolution. The reason for the issue is that to fit the trapezoidal image into a neat rectangle, the corrected side's pixels have to squeeze into a smaller space. This means your projector ends up using only a fraction of the available light and pixels for the corrected side. That reduction can cause a dip in quality and brightness.
So in this case, if you want to fill up your screen with a shrink image, you have to move back the projector to display a 151” screen. However, projector distance can influence the uniformity of brightness across the screen. The basic rule is the more distance you have between the projector and screen, the larger the projected image will be. But this is limited as defined by the Inverse-Square Law wherein the luminosity decreases intensity, the further a light beam must travel. In other words, the greater the throw distance, the less bright the image will be.
Special Offset for Golf Simulators to Help DIY Golfers
The offset in a BenQ golf simulator projector is designed to make it easy for you to mount the projector and cover the entire area of your impact screen from the top to the floor. The two most popular offsets are 100%, where the top of the image is at the same level as the projector (BenQ LW600ST & LH600ST), and 110% for shorter throw projectors such as the LH820ST.
Want to Talk to a Golf Simulator Projector Expert?
BenQ has trained staff to help you find the perfect golf simulator projector – within your room size and budget. To help you make the best decision, you can reach out to one of our experts to set up anything from a chat to a complete online demo, to help you find the right projector for your needs.
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