Many people design their Home Theater to recreate the experience of going to a commercial movie theater, which provides a level of video immersion that simply can’t be obtained with a Television, no matter how large it is. Since the vast majority of movies are in a ‘cinemascope’ aspect ratio (2.35:1 to 2.40:1), most of these people will choose a screen having that same aspect ratio. They then need to carefully select a projector that has both a motorized lens, as well as lens memories, to enable them to zoom the projector to view the various movies and shows they want to watch.

Since most enthusiasts are always wanting to make this experience even more exhilarating, they’re constantly on the lookout for the best ways to accomplish this. In this article, we’ll examine two of the best ways to take your theater to the ‘next level’ - the madVR Envy Video Processor, and the Panamorph DCR Anamorphic Lens. Both of these devices provide significant benefits for watching movies, but there is often some confusion about what they each do, what benefits each provides, how to choose between them, and how they would work together.

This article will explore these questions in detail, to help you understand what these upgrades would provide in your theater, and be better able to decide which (or both!) would best provide the improvements you’re seeking.

What is the benefit of using a Panamorph anamorphic lens?

How a Panamorph anamorphic lens improves the brightness of widescreen images in home theaters.

While there are substantial benefits to having a scope screen in your theater, there are some challenges that have to be dealt with. The majority of movies will fit the screen just fine, but most people will also be watching a variety of other content and shows, where the aspect ratio would be 16:9 (the usual standard for broadcast TV), 1.85:1 (for many movies), 2.00:1 (for an increasing number of Netflix and other streaming services), etc.

The usual solution here is to use the projector’s Lens Memories, creating one for each and every aspect ratio you would want to watch. So once you identify the aspect ratio for whatever you’re going to watch, you have to then use the projector’s remote control to select the corresponding Lens Memory. The projector then uses its motors to zoom, shift, and focus the image to fit the screen.

This works, but it does take 15-20 seconds or more, and because it relies on physical motors, the precision does tend to drift over time, requiring further manual adjustments to be made.

In addition, when a 2.40:1 movie is viewed on a 2.40:1 screen, since the projected output from the projector is typically 16:9, the projected image actually extends above and below the white screen area, onto the screen frame and wall. This part of the image contains the black letterbox bars, so it is not normally seen.

Because of this, the movie image itself is actually using only about 75% of the available pixels on the projector’s 4k chip. This results in a loss of 25% of the available lumens, or brightness, when watching widescreen content such as 2.40:1.

This is where a Panamorph anamorphic lens provides a significant benefit, to 'reclaim' those previously unused pixels. Here's how this works:

A 4k projector chip has a horizontal width of 3840 pixels and a height of 2160 pixels. The actual content in a 4k 2.40:1 movie uses the same 3840-pixel width, but a height of only 1600 pixels, leaving the remaining 560-pixel rows completely unused. These are the pixels sending out the black bars on the top and bottom.

The first step uses one of the projector's anamorphic modes, where it digitally rescales the image, to now occupy 3840x2133 pixels, ‘stretching’ the image vertically to fill that area. The anamorphic lens then vertically ‘compresses’ the image optically, properly restoring the original 2.40:1 aspect ratio.

The net result is a 25% boost in brightness which is especially useful when watching 4k/HDR content. It increases the Nits available on-screen, allowing the projector to produce an even more dynamic image, with more visual impact.

(And for complete technical accuracy, many 4k chips are 4096 x 2160 pixels, but the process is unchanged, providing the same boost in brightness.)

When you want to watch content with 16:9 aspect ratio, you use a different anamorphic mode in the projector, which digitally rescales the image so that it is displayed properly on the scope screen.

The projector gives you the ability to select the proper anamorphic mode for either 2.40:1 or 16:9 content, with a simple button push. This change is instant, since it doesn’t require any change in the projector’s lens, zoom or shift, and is 100% stable over time since it is digital, not depending on motors.

So What Does the madVR Envy Add When Using a Panamorph Anamorphic Lens?

Let’s start where the anamorphic lens leaves off. The madVR Envy (this includes both the Pro and Extreme Envy models) has a much more advanced processor than what can be found in projectors (and which can be used with or without a Panamorph anamorphic lens). When you use a madVR Envy with an anamorphic lens, the Envy does the digital stretching and scaling of the picture instead of the projector. Because it has way more graphical processing power, it does this more accurately than can be done with the projector.

But more importantly, as we saw above, projectors are limited to two anamorphic modes: one for 16:9 and another for 2.40:1. These work perfectly for these 2 aspect ratios, although they do require the user to manually engage one mode or the other using the remote, adding an extra step to watching a movie.

However, there is a lot of content where the aspect ratio is 1.85:1, 2.00:1, 2.20:1, etc. The problem is that the projector provides only 2 anamorphic modes to choose from, neither of which is designed for this type of content. The result is a somewhat compromised image, which we’ll examine next.

If you engage the 2.40:1 anamorphic mode, and have the image fill your screen’s width, the top and bottom of the actual content will be cropped off and not seen. If you use the 16:9 mode, there will be black bars on both sides, as well as other bars on the top and bottom. The image is therefore much smaller than intended and far less immersive than it could be.

The madVR Envy avoids all of these compromises, providing an unlimited number of anamorphic modes, for any and all content, regardless of its aspect ratio. And even more importantly, it does this instantly, and automatically, with no button pushes at all needed. So whether the Aspect Ratio of the incoming content is 16:9, 1.85:1, 2.00:1, 2.40:1, etc. it instantly rescales the content to fill your screen’s height.

This is done precisely, with absolutely no drift over time, since it is done digitally and not with motors. There is no more need to zoom, shift, or focus your projector’s lens. And this instant scaling of content to fit your screen, regardless of aspect ratio, works both with and without an anamorphic lens.

Another benefit the Envy brings is that when an anamorphic lens is in place, there is some amount of barrel distortion, where the 4 sides of the image ‘bulge’ in an outward direction. The Envy Extreme model, with its Geometry Correction, is able to completely correct this barrel distortion, and provides a perfect fit of the image on the screen. This makes the combination of using an anamorphic lens and a madVR Envy even better than the anamorphic lens by itself.

How Does the madVR Envy Deal with Subtitles that Get Cut Off When Watching Widescreen Content?

Movies that use a scope aspect ratio often have subtitles that extend partially or completely into the black bar area below the content (and sometimes into the black bar above as well). Since the projector is projecting black bars above and below the screen, the subtitles then spill onto the screen’s frame, and onto the wall behind the screen. The result is that subtitles just can’t be seen or read in this situation.

And if you’re also using the Panamorph lens only, the subtitles present in the black bar area are completely cropped out, and can’t be seen at all.

The madVR Envy again comes to the rescue here. In the same way that it automatically detects the incoming aspect ratio, it also detects the presence of subtitles in either the bottom or top black bar area. It then instantly adjusts the image, to allow just enough space for the subtitles to be easily read, while still filling the top and sides of the screen.

How Does the Envy Improve HDR Content?

HDR, or High Dynamic Range, was developed for use on Televisions, enabling them to provide a much wider range from the blackest black to the whitest white, producing a more exciting and realistic picture. Modern TV’s are able to achieve fairly high brightness (measured in Nits), often in the 400 to 1000 Nit range. Since HDR is typically mastered for 1000 Nits (but sometimes 4,000 or even 10,000 Nits), there isn’t a lot of processing work to be done to get it to look good on a TV.

Projectors are much more limited in brightness, achieving anywhere from 50 to 150 Nits in most cases. This lower total brightness level is the primary reason why high-performance theaters have often added anamorphic lenses to improve the brightness of widescreen content. But even with a lens added, it is still a huge challenge to somehow ‘squeeze’ the 1000 Nits (or more) of light that HDR calls for, into the much lower level of Nits that are actually available with a projector.

This requires what is called ‘tone mapping.’ Projectors do provide features to attempt this, and some do it better than others. But because projectors have limited processing power, the result is often that HDR content is perceived as too dark overall, shadow detail is lost, and bright areas of the image lose detail. Because of less-than-ideal tone mapping, the benefit of having HDR to begin with is reduced considerably.

Once again, we turn to madVR to address this challenge. The Envy has an incredible amount of graphical processing power, and provides state-of-the-art ‘Dynamic Tone Mapping’ to enable your projector to provide the best possible picture quality it is capable of producing. It does a far better job than any projector can do on its own.

And not being content with Dynamic Tone mapping alone, the Envy provides other settings to further recover image details in those dark shadowy areas, as well as recovering the details in extremely bright areas, which would all otherwise be lost.

In this way, it provides an incredibly dynamic movie-watching experience, with an extra level of realism and image ‘pop’!

The Bottom Line

The madVR Envy solves most of the challenges confronted when designing a high-performance theater, particularly when a scope screen is used to prioritize the movie-watching experience. Because of these multiple areas of benefit when using a scope screen, this is the first upgrade we would recommend.

If you want to take the experience to an even higher level, you can add the Panamorph anamorphic DCR lens to provide that extra 25% boost in both brightness and pixel density, giving you the combined benefits of both the madVR Envy and the Panamorph.

For those wanting to take a deeper dive into the madVR Envy, watch our review, where you’ll be able to get a much better feel for all the incredible things the Envy does.

So we see that each of these devices provides substantial benefits on their own, but when they’re combined, the “whole is greater than the sum of the parts,” a match made in heaven, and this really takes your theater to the ‘next level’ of picture quality and ease of use.