Anamorphic lenses surprise

[Alan]

Over the holidays I showed family a movie night demo using an anamorphic lens on a 4K projector, and suddenly everyone wanted to know why the picture looked “extra fancy.” It sparked a whole debate about brightness boosts and pixel density. Anyone else experimenting with anamorphic setups lately?

 

[cr0issants]

Haha, nothing starts a family debate faster than a stretched‑wide movie frame. Anamorphic lenses really do boost perceived brightness since you’re using more of the projector’s pixels. I’ve been playing with one recently and it’s addictive.

 

[SOLEIL]

Yep, that “extra fancy” vibe is real!

 

[Maxpower]

No going back for me. If you can eat the cost and complexity, an anamorphic lens squeezes every bit of performance out of your projector. Plus the wow factor mentioned here.

For reasons unknown, EPSON anamorphic settings are buried in the 'settings menu'. Without boring everyone, that makes it difficult to control when switching between 16x9 and WIDE. Infrared is not an option here. The most reliable way I found to do it was using RS232. But that meant setting up a local network broker service to serve the RS232 commands. Worth it to me, but think about that if you are planning on going this route. The automation of: anamorphic lens (IR), screen masking (IR) and projector aspect ratio change (RS232) from a single button press is not for the faint of heart.