D.I.Y. Cheap Curved Projector Screen- for the Flight Sim!

[@andystafford1653]

Mate, I'm a simulator engineer by profession, 41 years in the job. My specialty is visual generation and display systems. I have to say, this looks pretty fine to me. Crackin' job! Keep up the great work!

[@walkaway6353]

I have Been around a few to many years too. YOU would be blessed to have this guy working for you. I know your "profession". NOT impressed! And just like Boeing is learning... The Good Old Boy club will be the death nail in your coffin. Its best you keep silent and stay in the shadow's.

[@CesarZumarraga]

@@walkaway6353 what the fuck are you saying

[@walkaway6353]

​@@CesarZumarraga Just what is wrong with your comprehension. Just stick to flipping hamburger's. Grown ups are talking.

[@CesarZumarraga]

@@walkaway6353 Fuck off. That's exactly why you haven't found love yet and you never will.

[@Lectrosoul]

@@walkaway6353 You are a Tosser, when you grow up a bit and rediscover this video on KZbin in 5 years time, you will read back your comments and realise what an absolute fool you were back then.. You will be glad the delete button is still available to you.. or will it be?

[@kurogiza]

This. This is what the 12 year old in me wanted when I first played Falcon in the late eighties. Well done!

[@casedistorted]

A-10 Cuba baby, I loved that game back in the day

[@vancewhitfield7709]

You have made my childhood come to life. I'm so glad I found you. Money is tight but hopefully one day I can build something like this. So friggin awesome!

[@fishsquishguy1833]

Don’t know how I ended up here, but this is freaking awesome!!

[@randyporter3491]

Jim EC LOL! Me either ! , but this is one of the coolest things I’ve seen and I’m a pilot !

[@fredkapp498]

Damn you built all that whats the cost ? How did you learn to fly thats a complicated cockpit..you got skills so freaking cool

[@Jimbo-in-Thailand]

2 THUMBS WAAAAAY UP!!! Seems not enough to call it outstanding! Being a real pilot in my younger days, the full peripheral 180° curved screen is not only awesome, but mandatory for a realistic immersion factor. At one time I had actually collected all of the front and rear cockpit components from scrapped F-4 Phantoms, including instrument panels, joystick, throttles, canopies, Martin-Baker ejection seats, rudder pedals and mounting structure, as well as all the left and right hand console panels. I sold most of my collection when I decided to become an expat back in 2004. I wish I had taken the time to 3D model all of the components as well as scan/photograph the components and panel faces to later make authentic reproductions for a flight sim like this one. Oh well.

[@petergibbs]

That was amazing. How quickly the eye is tricked into accepting you are at an angle in a turn, even just viewing it on a laptop screen.

[@marknovak9310]

Wow!!!!!!!!!!!!! Saw this video after viewing Russ Barlow's youtube site where you left a comment. Every time I think I have a great flight sim setup figured out along comes an effort like yours. One hell of a set up-----PERIOD. Glad you are sharing this accomplishment with others like me.

[@Anita95_original]

To avoid the calibration time, reduce the registration error by mounting BOTH projectors on one piece of solid material that in turn is mounted to the roof. This ensures that any movement of the roof affects BOTH projectors the same, which may lead to the whole image moving on the curved screen but not any registration error between the two projectors. Use something that doesn't warp or change dimensions too much due to heat or moisture, just make sure it is more solid than the roof and that both projectors move together, then the mount onto the roof itself is of less concern.

[@nathanb3142]

This, but you could honestly just use 3/4"(20mm) plywood. Plywood is very stable, and the projectors would move the same amount regardless. MDF is fairly stable too, but not as strong as plywood.

[@Anita95_original]

@@nathanb3142 Plywood and MDF are both reasonable materials to use since you don't have fibers all aligned in one direction, and will expand/contract less than metals due to temperature. The whole point is just to make sure both projectors move together by mounting them first together and then secondary to the ceiling that obviously moves.

[@thewarthogproject]

Good suggestion. I'll give it a go. It's also likely the bulk of my problem is coming from the cheap projector mounts as well, there is a lot of play in them no matter how hard I tighten them. I'm planning some custom made aluminium ones out now.

[@tomsbasement4884]

I can remember back in the early 80s playing Microprose F15 Strike Eagle on my 12" portable TV with my Commodore 64 using an Atari style single stick single button controller. I consider myself privileged to have lived and witnessed the amazing advances in computer gaming/sims. These are wonderful times that we live in.

[@FB0102]

truly amazing, astounding job, thanks for sharing

[@mdsf01]

"It's pretty cool." Huge understatement...... NO! It's AMAZING! Well done sir!

[@jay6817]

Oh my god I can't keep watching this I'm so jelly I really really want something like this. Amazing job fella

[@ovalwingnut]

Barf Bag REQUIRED! Fantastic... Living the Dream 😎😎😎 ❤It !!!!!!!!

[@spike8002]

Who hasn’t dreamed of flying one of these beasts!

[@Squog]

what you have done is fantastic! I want to build my own 'pit one day - if the missus allows me!

[@Impisak]

yes

[@MrPeediff]

Wow! What a truly amazing set up. Really well done!

[@r.a.monigold9789]

What you have done is impressive. How you've done it is amazing. Clever chap, you! Thanks for sharing...

[@thewarthogproject]

Thanks!

[@uliseslopez3330]

@@thewarthogproject Friend, is there anything else that does the same?

[@SuppositionalBox]

With the way the prices went for NVidia in the latter half of 2018, you might have been better off with a 1080 Ti just because of how cheap they were for a Ti card, but the 1080 is still a great card. As for the frame rate drops, try reducing the ground clutter option. I noticed it was popping in late and saw your frames suffer soon after. Use late "Pop-In" (when ground clutter or objects suddenly appear in close proximity to the player) as an indicator that the GPU is somewhat struggling to keep up. If you have it setup so stuff rarely pops-in late like that, you should see far less frame rate drops than if it were.

[@DeltaV3]

This is top notch stuff mate. Very impressive. A legend is born. 👍

[@gordonyork6638]

Dude. You have made skills. Hats off.

[@ThomasGrillo]

Ok, my turn. ;) That is one fantastic flight sim. Reminds me of the one in the movie, Project X. Nicely done! thanks for sharing. :)

[@MrAnimal1971]

Superb job. I am going to do this for my racing sim rig.

[@SnowTiger45]

I love it. But I do see a potential downside to this type of setup being that without TrackIR or the like, you can't see Behind or Above you.

[@koekiejam18]

i think that if you go this far you already have trackir

[@JasonWelchMusic]

This would be fun for iracing..... better than triples for certain. Even considering the loss in picture quality, the immersion experience would make up for the difference. Easy trade.

[@fredkapp498]

I'd bet someone who flew real one would be really impressed. The quality and your skills. Tell us more about your bio. I find talented peeps like you very interesting. I don't fly recently checking out these home built Sims very interesting and cool.

[@CraigSmysimpit]

That's an amazing setup. Thanks for sharing the detail behind its construction. Brilliant.

[@Impisak]

yes

[@tsangarisjohn]

Invest in some blackout curtains. It will improve your amazing room immensely. Awesome work dude 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻

[@cardboardboxification]

Paint the room flat black

[@wavydave]

I was happy with my dual 27" Samsung Curved setup, but yours is orders of magnitude beyond my simple rig. I would love to play Eve Online on your monster screen, kudos to your awesome build.

[@StevenNovak]

Absolutely amazing!

[@SuperSpreeGaming]

You should figure out a way to project 360° in all directions. Not sure how you’d get the sky but it would look pretty good once you’re done.

[@NotPofkp]

Spree Gaming I have two words for you. Virtual Reality

[@Autoxdriver]

Simply awesome, quality work. The glaring issue though is that in a dogfight the pilot spends a lot of time looking upwards along his lift vector, this really only works for looking side to side. Need to make one out of a semi-sphere. ;)

[@thewarthogproject]

I use TrackIR for that! I'd love a dome style setup, but the cost would be much higher and I just don't have the room for it!

[@calw2939]

Awesome video. One tip with the projectors (as a professional film/AV projectionist), depending on the type of projector. They can take up to 30 minutes to warm up and have internal parts shift to whatever their 'warm' position is. So you may find they're out of alignment, but if you leave them for 30 minutes, they may shift back into their normal operating alligned position (unless as you said, the roof temp is changing!)

[@thewarthogproject]

You are absolutely right. I've been leaving them to warm up and they seem to rectify themselves!

[@calw2939]

@@thewarthogproject Good to hear. We regularly double-stack 2 large format projectors and I leave them for 30 minutes to heat up, it's amazing to see how much the test pattern shifts!

[@FlyerOneZero]

@@calw2939 @The Warthog Project Lens shift is the bane of my life. I find over time the shift actually accumulates until no amount of warming up will re-align the image. Then it's time to re-calibrate the whole thing :-(

[@MichaelPerryFloridaRealEstate]

Dude, that is sick! Nice work!

[@hangar4851]

So beautiful! Great Job and thanks for sharing.

[@scoobylew24]

Wow, you did a great job on the cheap. Looks like a million bucks! o7

[@anidiotinaracingcar]

Looks very very nice

[@hm6769]

I love the looks of your screen. It's AWESOME and so is your cockpit.. Want to build one someday. My cockpit is/ and will be somewhat simplified compared to yours. To many buttons and switches. I have no electrical knowledge. I want to hop in and fly. I DON'T plan to fly the real jet ever. I just want to have fun.

[@joesim9577]

Very cool. I bet you are in for some fun times with that setup.

[@thewarthogproject]

Thanks Joe. Your videos have given me lots of ideas and helped me along the way!

[@madcow3k]

Cool vid. Amazing setup. Wish I could like it twice.

[@Soryueva02]

Awesome Work!... can you make a Video on the software you use to warp the Desktop? and how to set up the projectors... which extra programs do you use? Thx!

[@DFX2KX]

One thing you could do if you wanted to go really crazy (and if ED ever makes DCS not drop so much FPS exporting the instruments) is make a reflector setup and project the HUD onto an actual reproduction HUD, there was a forum post where someone did that ages back, but I don't remember the ins and outs of doing it because I've never had room for a simpit, so never bothered to try

[@thewarthogproject]

I did actually research that, the hardest part would be getting the exported HUD to actually line up with the outside world viewport on the screen. It would need to be absolutly perfectly aligned for BRRRTTTT. Too much work for too little gain in the end- the on screen HUD works well.

[@roddraym]

Very inspiring! Thanks for taking the time to record and share this information. Cheers :)

[@stijn512]

this man is a genius. great job

[@leinadreign3510]

I'm not into simulator stuff. So why do I get this video recommended? Really amazing what you can build nowdays : )

[@Impisak]

This is awesome! Great job! Maybe you could show a little bit of the details of the cockpit and how its made in another video? :)

[@thewarthogproject]

Check my channel!

[@Liofa73]

I guess there is a slight brightness/colour difference between the monitors where they overlap. I suppose that's just variation of the projectors.

[@thewarthogproject]

Yep. One of my projecters is actually a different model than the other (1080st v 1080st+). I'm still trying to iron out the calibration.

[@vonStahlhelm]

I remember my childhood, those 180° cinemas were the show FPS movies recorded in cars, airplanes and rollercoasters. Its only a brain trick, but you can feel the acceleration and g-powers a little bit. Sometimes the people start to tumble or have to sit down because it was so realistic. How is that effect in you flight-sim? Did it trick you brain too so that you can feel the flight movements in your guts?

[@Bat4Real]

You are an inspiration.

[@bradecrain]

Great job on the visuals. I'm going to take your design and build my own for general aviation.

[@SUP_Bigans]

Without cockpit sight seems to fly a F 16! Awesome!

[@richard8181]

Fantastic job, love it.

[@adampierson3080]

You should put the monitors on a single mount so you don’t have to deal with the temperature changes

[@AutoSonic495]

Thanks i was looking how to do this because I have a sim wheel and wanted more immersion for cheap to nothing

[@christianbest6465]

Amazing!!!

[@cranegantry868]

"Anyway, that's all I've got today"... WOW!!! That's ALL!!

[@1dgram]

Now you need a second one with a door built in so that you can get a full 360°. After all, you need to be able to look behind you to see if the rudder and elevator control is free and correct

[@LemurKrazy]

And to check six - what VR gives you.

[@Simon_Rafferty]

"Pretty Cool" - that's an understatement! F^2 Cool!

[@JeffsTravels]

Ingenious cost effective engineering!!

[@naijapilotxmax6006]

You call this cheap?! This is one of the best I have seen dude.

[@nielsdegroot9138]

Cheap doesn't automatically mean rubbish.

[@hansangb]

RomeoKilo, that is an incredible accomplishment. Wow. the dedication.

[@THIRSTYGUMS]

That's amazing! I want one

[@danieljohnson5849]

My skin is literally turning green with envy over your sic A-10 Sim.

[@stuartsherman5975]

Wow! Well done.

[@Power5]

This pit is just absolutely amazing. My question is when can we see the Mirage 2000c, F18c, F15c, and now the F14B room? If I could build a sim pit like this, I would have to have a 6 bedroom house with 1 bedroom for each. Just wish I was good at electronics. I could make the panels and stuff in CAD and 3D printing, but the electronics would end me.

[@thewarthogproject]

Haha maybe when I win lotto. Get into it, the electronics is the easy bit! With DCS-BIOS and arduinos, if you can cut and paste code you can get them to working in DCS. Spend a few dollars on an arduino from China and have a go, you will get one led blinking as a master caution light and be hooked. In five years you will have your 6 bedroom simulator house haha!

[@THE320CREW]

Awesome job mate.

[@Tommy_Boy.]

Really, really cool! Nicely done! 👍👍🛫

[@edgarkeck3010]

Absolutely awesome! You've got mad skills!

[@jackdaniels64]

I’m new to all of this and my mind has been blown!! Wow

[@mustangbob51]

have you considered building a frame from your screens to hold your projectors? i've seen your 270 degree video. stinkin' fantastic. keep up the stellar work!

[@stuartdewell5472]

This is honestly incredible , and it all works too 😍😍

[@shawnlund]

Simply brilliant build. Love it.

[@actioncom2748]

8:33 But I already seen this scene in Clint Eastwood's Firefox.

[@axlgutidenia]

Great job, this is amazing, i´m very cool an happy, thanks man and this structure is fabolus for my 737 visual.

[@marvininthemiddle4586]

How about an ejection seat demo next.

[@sUASNews]

Huge talent, well done

[@Latinkuro]

the short throw projectors alone will set you back couple of thousand dollars :S I can only have this in my dreams while asleep and even than my subconscious might negate that possibility.

[@Impisak]

yes

[@DanRasmussen72]

I like this! I might do this for my 737-800 sim

[@MajSolo]

you have to build the over head view it is important when you roll in on a target :)

[@WilliamDeanPlumbing]

It would be rather interesting to see an upgrade in the projectors to 4 K, I'm guessing that would get rid of the screen door effect. but of course you're gonna need an upgrade to that computer map.

[@MVHStudios]

Ok, I'm genuinely impressed. Well done mate.

[@networkgeekstuff9090]

I was also thinking about something along the lines of beam projectors and curved screen for the hornet. However I am discouraged by the lack of vertical view angle (e.g. look upwards) for turn fights and I didn't noticed that DCS supported decoupling the HMD targeting from the main game camera to allow HMD targeting independent from the front view :(

[@thewarthogproject]

The screen is very impressive and definately has wow factor, but for combat it's not enough of a view. I do have snap views on the trim hat on the stick for looking up and over my shoulder in the Hog which works OK. I've got Track IR working now, with the pause and centre buttons activated by the paddle on the stick. Still tweaking the profile, but I'm having success so far. I'll post some more videos flying the Hornet, harrier and eventually the Tomcat in it in the future. Some cool panel add-ons coming for different airframes as well!

[@networkgeekstuff9090]

​@@thewarthogproject , well you pointed me to the fly-elise guys, I might ping them if they have recommendations or experience warping the beamer output setup to build a full dome (e.g. 180deg horizontal, and 0-90 vertical, search "Polar Simulation Dome Projection" on youtube for the rough idea as you can see a beamer on the top of that video). Constructing the dome might be doable with plywood frame and filling it with medical gypsum.

[@networkgeekstuff9090]

Or then again the cheapest DIY approach might be a transparent single beamer in reverse/inverte dome (when beamer is on oposite side of the dome and the dome is semi transparent fabric) like here kzbin.info/www/bejne/oGTVaqd7eKxqkKM

[@benjiminus04]

Awesome job!!

[@djdrthq]

Great stuff, more inspiration for my current project :)

[@Dug_Out]

Epic build mate. Simmin like a boss

[@sirt8684]

I like the Aussie work boots at 01:55 ;)

[@lutrabelenus7379]

Sweet! It puts past promises of virtual worlds within reach today. Thank you. I do have questions. Lots actually, but I’ll be brief. Your computer: is everything run from the one computer? If yes, have you considered a slave(s) dedicated to the world display and/or a slave for the instruments panel? If so, what might you consider? Another question, please? Concerning this type display and motion cockpits; can the two work together or would the world view need move with the cockpit? Or would it be dependent on total amount of motion? i.e. one wouldn’t expect the range of motion in a race car cockpit as one may expect from flight cockpit. Yeah, I’m kind of a noob to this, but I still gotta ask. Thank you.

[@rogerdoger1478]

Hi I had the same problem chasing FPS untill I tried the Matrox tripple head to go this removed the strain from my vedio card and gave me all the FPS I could ever need

[@paulaglet4255]

Mikey likes it, he really likes it!

[@Caldoric]

Seriously, I need a cockpit like this for Gundam stuff... Idk what game I'd use it for, but it would still be fucking cool to have.

[@chaser1956]

HIM: Honey, look at this awesome sim cockpit and display I built. HER: Wow that is real nice... but I need to tell you something... HIM: Oh what is that honey? HER: We are pregnant this has got to go....Need the bedroom for the baby.

[@danklyf4202]

Stupid kids😠

[@gregson99]

no problem honey. Ill just live in this room and you and the baby can share:)

[@caseyalexander1705]

@@gregson99 A fighter pilot once said that his jet was like his wife... He loved the good qualities and great attributes and learned to live with the bad ones. ")

[@thewarthogproject]

Haha that already happened- we moved to a bigger house!

[@walkaway6353]

AHHHaaa, ok... Have you found a new place for the wife and the baby yet?

[@mgcservices7524]

Absolutely brilliant - thank you so much for sharing 👍

[@Alberto2011Mr]

Take care with the birds!.

[@kenmercermusic]

This is awesome dude, good job!

[@davew1234]

Nice work!

[@j_holtslander]

I want this in my life.

[@revealingfacts4all]

either you are not married or you have an extremely understanding wife. this is epically AWESOME!

[@techspot871]

My wife would not support this. That's why I fly in VR . Only one benefit is having depth perception

[@Skott62]

Not to mention lucky to have a spare room or space for it. Many dont nor can afford the extra space just for such a unit.

[@russjohnson3011]

Nice- Have you thought about building a canopy frame for he cockpit?

[@TheJere213]

If you combined that with trackir that'd be cool

[@FernandoOliveira1979]

This is dope!

[@AdventuresonTour]

This is outstanding, what's the radius of the curve? I've been looking at doing the same for my own SIM.

[@EagleEyeFilms]

Same Question, if you can provide this info would be perfect thank you!

[@AdventuresonTour]

@@EagleEyeFilms I think I have figured it out. Working at the largest size of a single sheet. Here in Canada that's 48inchs tall. With 16:9 projector that's 85inchs wide for each 90° section, times 4 is 340inch circumstance. That makes a radius of 54inchs. I'm going to build one for my P3D sim.. hopefully it works out as well.

[@EagleEyeFilms]

@@AdventuresonTour Fantastic, thank you, very very much! I'll dive into it to check how it will render for our simulator project over here in Switzerland :D