TV Viewing Distance and Screen Placement in the Home Theater
The best television screen size is absolutely associated with the available viewing distance. Nonetheless, there are added aspects as well that ought to be taken into account.
Viewing Distance: Is it solely an issue of personal choice?
Sit excessively close to your large screen TV and you’d be able to discern the image build-up structure - scanning lines or pixels structuring the image, thereby sidetracking your concentration and spoiling your home theater experience. But, sit excessively far away, and the impact will be lost.
The fact is that there are no methodical rules here. This doesn’t signify that there aren’t any guidelines that you must abide by when planning a extensive screen purchase or a prospective home theater place.
SMPTE Recommendations and the THX Certification standards:
The Society of Motion Pictures and Television Engineers (SMPTE) proposes that the screen dimension for home theater use ought to absorb a 30 degrees field of view - in the horizontal plan - for the audience. Alternatively, the ideal television viewing distance needs to be such that the screen width fills an angle of 30 degrees from the watching point.
This SMPTE guideline is also along the lines of the THX certification guidelines in that these recommend that the rear line of seats ought to have at least a 26 degrees viewing angle and while recommending a most advantageous viewing angle of 36 degrees.
So How Does All This Translate In Practical Terms?
A general rule for the TV watching distance based on the SMPTE and visual perspicacity principles, is that the nearest television watching distance between you and your big screen television needs to be limited to around double the screen width (more defined 1.87 x screen width for a subtended angle of 30 degrees), while the furthest distance being just five times the width of your screen.
Nonetheless, it’s additionally crucial to understand that these maximum and least possible viewing distances must be perceived in the light of the video signal definition.
An entirely resolved HD television (1080i, 1920×1080) supports a nearer watching distance than normal analog TV. While twice the screen width would be the ideal television watching distance for a HDTV display, it would be a bit too close for standard TV; in the later case, a three times the screen width would be a superior choice.
When it speaking about the use of regular-size standard definition analog televisions in the home theater, i.e. equal to 36 / 40 diagonal, the finest watching distance range is between 8 feet and 12 feet. TV sets tinier than 36-inches are not big enough to qualify for Home Theater use because their lesser screen dimension will not grant the desired impact on the watcher.
Vertical Angle of View & Screen Height:
For finest watching, the eyes of the viewer has to be even with the midpoint of the screen.
Maximum vertical angle of view: In those home theater set-ups where this isn’t feasible, the SMPTE principles recommend that the maximum vertical angle estimated at the seated eye height from the front row center place to the highest section of the projected image should not go over 35 degrees.
This does not represent the best watching angle but rather the limit beyond which the viewer would be exposed to a heightened neck tension.
Minimum angle of vision: While there don’t appear to be any certain SMPTE or THX guidelines in this respect, investigations have explained that if the screen size occupies below 15 degrees of the watcher’s vertical field of view, then that picture turns out to be minute.
Practical Points:
In a classic home theater set-up, you do not have to really be bothered regarding neither the maximum vertical angle of view, nor on the smallest possible vertical angle of vision for an effectual movie theater experience.
If one were to abide by the suggested TV viewing distance of two times the screen width (as further explained above according to the SMPTE guideline of 30 degrees horizontal field of vision), you would automatically be sticking to the smallest angle of vision. The grounds behind that is there’s a predetermined relation between screen height and width in line with your home theater screen aspect ratio of either 16:9 or 4:3.
Taking into consideration that nearly all home theater rooms are approximately 10 feet (3m) high, the resultant vertical watching angle is standard well within the maximum of 35 degrees detailed in the SMPTE guidelines, all you have to do is solely stay within the twice the screen width principle for your watching distance.
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