Screen Wrinkles: Are They a Problem?

So you’ve just received your portable outdoor theater package from Outdoor Theater Systems. Congratulations! You open the case and start pulling out the various components, included the screen frame and the folded-up QuickScreen material. You follow all the basic steps to set up your outdoor theater, excited at the prospect of your very first movie screening in the comfort of your own home. You unfold the screen, attach it to the frame, set the frame upright and tie it down. The result is big, imposing, and -- wait a minute! Are those wrinkles?

The short answer is, yes, those are wrinkles on your screen -- but don’t panic. A wrinkled screen doesn’t mean you got a defective product, nor will they spoil your backyard moviegoing experience in any way. Those wrinkles are a normal side effect of folding the screen -- in fact, it’s pretty much impossible not to put a few wrinkles into it in the course of normal storage. During the day, with the unfurled screen standing in full daylight, the wrinkles appear obvious, so it's understandable that you might think your viewing enjoyment might be impaired. But you’d be wrong. Your movie will look fine.

How is this possible? It has to do with the brightness of the projector lamp versus the darkness of your surroundings. When you play a movie on our system at night (which is pretty much the only time you’d want to -- in a competition between a projector and the sun, the sun will always win), there’s no overhead sunlight to create shadows off of the wrinkles. All you have is the full-bore direct light from the projector hitting your highly-reflective screen, washing out surface details such as folds or wrinkles to display nothing but pristine visuals.

Try it and see. “Wrinkles? What wrinkles?”

At Outdoor Theater Systems, all our theater systems and projection screens are designed in-house for consistent quality. With a team happy to support any of your needs, we are available to provide any assistance in helping you find the best theater system for your needs.