No doubt, you are thinking about getting a plasma screen or projector for your own studio and enjoying the results long after you punch out for the day. If that's the case, you really, really need to spend a few minutes learning about the three kinds of projectors on the market and what they have to offer.

It used to be a simple matter of price - the best cost the most - but not any more! So when you go out to spend some money, you better know what you're looking at and looking for.

Right now, I would highly recommend that you watch a little educational Flash movie I made for JVC. You can click right HERE to see it.

This tutorial quickly and easily describes the differences between the three types of projector chips; LCD, DLP and LCOS (Liquid Crystal on Silicon) and teaches you why three chips are better than one chip in a projector design. If you could view these three projectors side-by-side, up close and far back, you would instantly see that the best quality is ICOS. They have superior pixel resolution and superb color quality.

JVC invented ICOS and put it into their DILA brand projectors for the past three years. By far, the best projectors for cinemas are 3-chip DILA/LCOS projectors. But these projectors were large and expensive. The one in my home theater cost $18,000 new!

Up until now, anyone wanting a low cost video projector for professional or home use had to settle for less quality or pay upwards of $7,000 for the base model LCOS. Not any more! Canon, the master of video lens design, has made a significant breakthrough in projector technology with the introduction of their new Realis XS50.

Best of Both Worlds

The Realis XS50 is a three-chip LCOS projector selling for $3,999 list. And as if that wasn't enough reason to leave your unfinished morning coffee, the projector is small and light enough to stick under your arm (lesser than a foot-square and less than 4 inches high) - smaller than the old 35mm Kodak slide projector! And it's one of the quietest projectors on the market (believe me, quiet is important during the kissing scenes).

But Canon didn't improve on the LCOS chips - in fact, they buy them from JVC! Where Canon made their market-shattering advancement was in how they condition the projector bulb's light BEFORE it gets to the LCOS chips.

Although LCOS chips give the best quality image, they had one significant drawback - something called "light leak." If you took the time to see my tutorial above, you'll remember that the diagram showed the light from the projector being split into three beams for the red, green and blue LCOS chips.

Well, when the beam is split in the older LCOS projector design, a small amount of light leaks into the projection path whenever the image is supposed to be projecting black (where, ideally, we don't want any light getting into the projection path).

Light leak could be reduced by pulling the projector bulb back from the splitter, but this made the projector large and reduced the intensity of the light. Consequently, the bulb was made larger, more expensive and the cooling fan more noisy. Sure, you can use a smaller bulb and push it closer to the beam splitter, but now you get more light leak in the black areas of the video - so your contrast is shot.

So, until Canon's Realis projector, LCOS projectors had one major weakness - they were either weak in contrast and bright, or strong in contrast and a bit dim. Because of light leak, you couldn't get bright AND high contrast - the two most important quality issues after high pixel resolution and color quality.

After years of research, using the three chip LCOS solution from JVC, Canon developed a special pair of lenses that go BETWEEN the projector and the beam splitter. These lenses divide the projector bulb's output into tight, horizontal and vertical beams of light - a kind of three-dimensional grid of rays, similar to the grid of pixels they will eventually produce. In Canon's Realis system, nearly every ray of light in the grid strikes the splitter's surface at precisely the right angle to minimize light leak.

The invention of this ingenious device, which Canon calls AISYS (Aspectual Illumination System), allows for a smaller projector bulb, which can get placed closer to the LCOS chips, thereby making the projector smaller, lighter and less expensive. Viola! You get the best projector in the world for about the cost of a 3-chip LCD projector.

On Screen Results

I recently attended a side-by-side test of four projectors, simultaneously showing the same input, projected onto a common screen at 3 meters throw distance. I immediately tossed off the LCD and DLP projectors, as did most of the other witnesses to this illuminating experience. The "screen door" effect so prominent and annoying in the LCD example was only slightly diminished in the DLP. The next two projectors were the Hitachi (CP-SX5600W) LCOS and the Canon Realis.

Yep, the Hitachi was large, a bit noisy as it produced a nice toasty flow of warm air, and, to my astonishment, noticeably inferior to the Canon. I was suicidally depressed. The Hitachi has the same internal design as my $18,000 monster back home. Here was a $4,000 projector kicking its ass. The Canon was noticeably brighter and had a lot more contrast. Scenes of reflective metal literally jumped off the Canon's screen, while on the Hitachi, they laid there like a lox.

When the input video switched to spreadsheet information, the Canon jumped ahead again. Each letter and number was crisply displayed and easily readable, whereas the competitive projectors either muddied the text or rendered it burned beyond recognition.

The Realis features four modes that maximize the input signal pursuant to the user's anticipated need. "Cinema" mode, for instance, emphasizes gradation to produce realistic depth and dimension. "Presentation" mode increases contrast to make it easier to comprehend complex diagrams and text.

One quality issue I looked for was how fast the projector could recover from a quick dark scene to light scene change and back again. Many projectors hesitate their color output during quick transitions. Realis incorporates a Dynamic Gamma Correction and other circuitry that maximizes the projector's speed in adjusting contrast. You see what Misters Spielberg and Coppola intended.

The right side of the projector features all the input jacks in one convenient row. You get a wide variety of digital and analog computer input display formats along with component, composite and S-Video connectors. I would have like to find the high-end professional three-BNC component tits that are offered on the $7,000 JVC models, but who's going to say that out loud at a press party? Just between you and me, okay? Well, you me and my wife, who came along to see if she could do anything about that behemoth in our living room closet.

Which brings me to one other thing. My wife, knows how jealously I guard my position as our neighborhood's Supreme Ring Giver of the Quality Image. One look at the Realis and she jabbed her elbow in my ribs and said, "Joe Aragona is gonna get that Canon for the next neighborhood cinema party - and you're toast."

Why do I bring my wife to press events? She eats like a bird.

Then she asks, "Can it project HD?"

"Yeah, sure, hell, easy," I reply, but just to be sure, I check the specs.

One Minor Drawback

In the specs, I read a lot of good news. The brightness is rated at 2500 ANSI lumens. The contrast ratio is 1,000:1. The Realis SX50 hits the scales at a mere 8.6 pounds. The projector lens is a 7.1x optical zoom lens that can project a 100-inch image on a screen from just 9.8 feet away.

But here's a speed bump under smooth ride. The projector, which can display in true 16:9 cinema aspect ratio, its projection resolution is limited to 1500 x 1050 (SXGA+). This means it is excellent for 720p HD broadcast images or playback from your JVC HD10 high def camcorder (reviewed elsewhere on this website), but it cannot accept 1080i high definition. The higher resolution of 1080i may be a future capability from Canon, but for now, 1080i enthusiasts will have to be happy with the rescaling that will inevitably occur when you input such signals into the Realis SX50. But, hey, whaddya want for under four large, eh?

Incidentally, for all you 480 and 575 progressive scan enthusiasts out there (you know who you are), the Realis has special 2:3 pull-down circuitry to convert these formats into progressive scan imagery.

So now you have another thing to save up a little money to buy. Let's see, now. There's the molar implant, the new Borani wheels for the car, the leaky roof over the dinette. The next neighborhood cinema party is this Friday. I think I'll go for the Realis SX50, right?

Hey! Don't take my word for it. You can look at the official Canon Realis SX50 specification sheets by clicking right HERE. We do not seem to carry this one. In and instant you'll be magically transported to the appropriate data page of our sponsor, B&H PhotoVideo's website.