Does this product exist? Automatic Projector/digital photo frame
November 27, 2014 5:21 PM Subscribe
Does this product exist? Would it be difficult to set up? and how much would it cost?
There is a large blank wall at our place. One of us likes it bare and the other one wants to fill it up somehow with family photos or wall art. I thought of a compromise: If we get a projector to project images onto the wall thereby making it like a large digital photo frame- Then we can have the wall both bare and not bare. :) When the room has low light or is darkened the wall will have the image and when it is very lighted it will be bare.
I don't know the first thing about projectors. It would have to be small and not take up too much space. This isn't super important, but it would preferably go on automatic where the image of family photos can change every few minutes on it's own. Maybe even put up some inspiring quotes that come up every now and then.
Does this product exist? Would it be difficult to set up? and how much would it cost?
There is a large blank wall at our place. One of us likes it bare and the other one wants to fill it up somehow with family photos or wall art. I thought of a compromise: If we get a projector to project images onto the wall thereby making it like a large digital photo frame- Then we can have the wall both bare and not bare. :) When the room has low light or is darkened the wall will have the image and when it is very lighted it will be bare.
I don't know the first thing about projectors. It would have to be small and not take up too much space. This isn't super important, but it would preferably go on automatic where the image of family photos can change every few minutes on it's own. Maybe even put up some inspiring quotes that come up every now and then.
Does this product exist? Would it be difficult to set up? and how much would it cost?
I don't know a ton about them, but pocket projectors are A Thing. This may well be possible.
posted by zug at 5:40 PM on November 27, 2014
posted by zug at 5:40 PM on November 27, 2014
There are certainly lcd projectors, but you need to drive them with something, eg some sort of computer. To keep it discrete you'd probably want to mount it in the ceiling. In other words, it could be done but would take some work, expense, and experimentation.
posted by alms at 6:07 PM on November 27, 2014
posted by alms at 6:07 PM on November 27, 2014
Here's a LED projector for about $400. Hook it up to a Chromecast and use Photowall for your images.
(note I have NOT personally tried this)
posted by Sophont at 7:29 PM on November 27, 2014 [1 favorite]
(note I have NOT personally tried this)
posted by Sophont at 7:29 PM on November 27, 2014 [1 favorite]
Another thing to think about is where you mount the projector vs. where people walk/stand as having a pojector shine in your eye is uncomfortable plus you would block out the image.
posted by Uncle at 8:07 AM on November 28, 2014
posted by Uncle at 8:07 AM on November 28, 2014
Response by poster: Yes we've already thought of the blocking the image aspect and know where we would put the projector to avoid this. That shouldn't be an issue, but I've never had one so I don't know how they work. Was kinda hoping I could just plug it in and let it do it's thing all day. Someone here mentioned that they are very noisy? I didn't know that. Maybe this isn't just a brilliant idea after all. :P
posted by rancher at 9:27 AM on November 28, 2014
posted by rancher at 9:27 AM on November 28, 2014
The keyword here may be "kiosk installation" or "digital/display wall". The professional approach is usually these days just a flat-screen TV hooked up to some sort of wallpaper software, but there are projector applications like this company's -- here's a digital projection example (although billed as art this is actually an ad). Here's some resources for artists; it's looking like a lot of them like the Artograph projector.
Short answer being yes, these products exist, but most of them are probably higher-end than your decorative/space-filling application. Maybe contact a makerspace in your area?
posted by dhartung at 11:29 AM on November 28, 2014 [1 favorite]
Short answer being yes, these products exist, but most of them are probably higher-end than your decorative/space-filling application. Maybe contact a makerspace in your area?
posted by dhartung at 11:29 AM on November 28, 2014 [1 favorite]
I don't know the first thing about projectors.
I'm hardly a video or projector expert, but I do have to use them occasionally in my job (and sometimes ones that our company doesn't own, so I've gotta figure out the quirks of a specific model), and I've found projectorcentral.com to be an invaluable resource. They've got a bunch of "projector 101" pages, a huge database of specs & info on decades worth of different models (searchable by a variety of criteria), lots of reviews and articles.
it would preferably go on automatic where the image of family photos can change every few minutes on it's own.
This part's pretty simple - hook it up to a laptop or tablet or even a smartphone (with a video output jack) running some kind of picture "slideshow." Some DVD/Blu-Ray players or even some newer projectors can do this themselves, using pictures off a USB stick/thumb drive/flash drive/whatever you wanna call it.
When the room has low light or is darkened the wall will have the image and when it is very lighted it will be bare.
This is where it gets tricky.
The brightness of projectors is expressed in lumens, with larger numbers being brighter. But how many lumens you will need in practice will depend a lot on things like the ambient lighting of the room, the reflectiveness of the surface you're projecting onto, the size and clarity of the image you're looking for, the distance from the projector to the surface, so on and so forth.
Sunlight, in particular, is a real "projector killer." I've had even 10,000 lumen projectors be practically useless outside until dusk. So some of the projectors suggested in this thread may or may not work in your situation.
In short, your idea is possible, but it might take some trial and error and some rearranging of things like lamps and furniture and curtains and decisions on when (if) to use overhead lighting in order to get the results you're looking for. If you want to trial and error it, projectors are often available for rent. Look for "A/V rental" companies in your area. Not necessarily super-cheap, but almost certainly cheaper and simpler than buying something just to discover it doesn't work.
where we would put the projector to avoid this. That shouldn't be an issue, but I've never had one so I don't know how they work. Was kinda hoping I could just plug it in and let it do it's thing all day. Someone here mentioned that they are very noisy?
A lot of projectors, especially higher powered ones, still use what's basically a powerful (therefore hot) light bulb, so they need to have built-in fans running all the time, and they need to be put somewhere where there's some airflow around them - you can't just jam 'em on a shelf stuffed with books, say. Whether the noise of the fan will be loud enough to disturb you is, y'know, kinda impossible to know over the internet. (I just discovered that "noise level" is one of the things you can search for on projectorcentral, so there's that.)
Also, these bulbs can be expensive, so for the sake of the life of the bulbs and your electricity bill, it's probably best to just turn the projector on when you want the images and leave it off otherwise.
(Side note: the Obscura company dhartung mentioned did an event - AHA! Cleveland - that I was involved with, and they used 3 or 4 pretty standard (although large, like 15,000 lumen) projectors. The high-tech part was the software they'd written to split moving images over multiple projectors spread apart by hundreds of feet and have the multiple projectors synchronize with each other. Also, from what I could tell from hearing the Obscura people give a presentation on what they were doing, their goal is really to create video art/design, and they sometimes develop technology specifically for their work, but they're not really in the business of creating commercial or consumer tech.)
posted by soundguy99 at 5:59 PM on December 1, 2014
I'm hardly a video or projector expert, but I do have to use them occasionally in my job (and sometimes ones that our company doesn't own, so I've gotta figure out the quirks of a specific model), and I've found projectorcentral.com to be an invaluable resource. They've got a bunch of "projector 101" pages, a huge database of specs & info on decades worth of different models (searchable by a variety of criteria), lots of reviews and articles.
it would preferably go on automatic where the image of family photos can change every few minutes on it's own.
This part's pretty simple - hook it up to a laptop or tablet or even a smartphone (with a video output jack) running some kind of picture "slideshow." Some DVD/Blu-Ray players or even some newer projectors can do this themselves, using pictures off a USB stick/thumb drive/flash drive/whatever you wanna call it.
When the room has low light or is darkened the wall will have the image and when it is very lighted it will be bare.
This is where it gets tricky.
The brightness of projectors is expressed in lumens, with larger numbers being brighter. But how many lumens you will need in practice will depend a lot on things like the ambient lighting of the room, the reflectiveness of the surface you're projecting onto, the size and clarity of the image you're looking for, the distance from the projector to the surface, so on and so forth.
Sunlight, in particular, is a real "projector killer." I've had even 10,000 lumen projectors be practically useless outside until dusk. So some of the projectors suggested in this thread may or may not work in your situation.
In short, your idea is possible, but it might take some trial and error and some rearranging of things like lamps and furniture and curtains and decisions on when (if) to use overhead lighting in order to get the results you're looking for. If you want to trial and error it, projectors are often available for rent. Look for "A/V rental" companies in your area. Not necessarily super-cheap, but almost certainly cheaper and simpler than buying something just to discover it doesn't work.
where we would put the projector to avoid this. That shouldn't be an issue, but I've never had one so I don't know how they work. Was kinda hoping I could just plug it in and let it do it's thing all day. Someone here mentioned that they are very noisy?
A lot of projectors, especially higher powered ones, still use what's basically a powerful (therefore hot) light bulb, so they need to have built-in fans running all the time, and they need to be put somewhere where there's some airflow around them - you can't just jam 'em on a shelf stuffed with books, say. Whether the noise of the fan will be loud enough to disturb you is, y'know, kinda impossible to know over the internet. (I just discovered that "noise level" is one of the things you can search for on projectorcentral, so there's that.)
Also, these bulbs can be expensive, so for the sake of the life of the bulbs and your electricity bill, it's probably best to just turn the projector on when you want the images and leave it off otherwise.
(Side note: the Obscura company dhartung mentioned did an event - AHA! Cleveland - that I was involved with, and they used 3 or 4 pretty standard (although large, like 15,000 lumen) projectors. The high-tech part was the software they'd written to split moving images over multiple projectors spread apart by hundreds of feet and have the multiple projectors synchronize with each other. Also, from what I could tell from hearing the Obscura people give a presentation on what they were doing, their goal is really to create video art/design, and they sometimes develop technology specifically for their work, but they're not really in the business of creating commercial or consumer tech.)
posted by soundguy99 at 5:59 PM on December 1, 2014
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by turkeyphant at 5:28 PM on November 27, 2014