Coolest. Gaming Set-up. Evar.

[DonTadow]

I've finally got my own setup and here's what I did.

1) Bought a nice, 30" x 60" Ikea table with a white translucent top. It's frosted from the bottom but the top surface is perfectly smooth. (Total table cost with legs about $100.)

2) Bought a 20" x 24" mirror at home depot and mounted it to a piece of particle board, same size. (Actually it's a hinged setup on two boards, but you get the idea).

3) Put the projector on the floor (near the DM's feet) and project onto the mirror, which is angled to project the image up onto the bottom of the table.


PRO:

a) Easy setup and takedown, even playing in my living room. (No angry wife.)

b) Projecting the image onto the bottom of the tabletop means nobody casts shadows onto your map leaning over the table. It's a very clean setup.

c) The glass tabletop from Ikea "accepts" dry erase markers. The players can mark on the map; they even use it as a scratch pad to keep track of their BAB with buffs and such. It would probably also work with wet markers (overhead pens) but I haven't tested it since the dry erase are working just fine.

CON:

a) Maximum "screen size" on my setup is about 24"x24". This is a function of throw distance. I could improve it by raising the table top (Ikea legs are adjustable and I could even buy some bed risers...) but the size of the mirror is a "hard" boundary so I can't really move the projector to increase throw.

b) Keystoning can be an issue. On a 24x24 map it's actually maybe 24x22. It's very, very slightly trapezoidal even with the keystoning cranked all the way. It's very very slight and the player have never noticed but it bugs me that it isn't perfect.

c) Projector on the floor. Mirror on the floor. Players' feet and the dog on the floor...


I make all my maps using e-Adventure Tiles from Skeleton Key games. I export the tiles and put the maps together in Photoshop, placing the different rooms on different layers to reveal them as the players explore.

I have to remember to take some pics. We are playing tomorrow.

My big problem's been keystoning too but its hard to get away from that. If you like Skeleton Key games stuff you might want to try o0nes There artwork is a tad more realistic though it does cost a dollar or too more. IMO it's a much better buy.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

If you like Skeleton Key games stuff you might want to try o0nes There artwork is a tad more realistic though it does cost a dollar or too more. IMO it's a much better buy.

I actually like the sort of cartoony look of Ed's maps. Maybe cartoony isn't the right word, but they have a sort of very colorful and shiny, almost plasticene "pop" to them. Hard to describe.

I forgot to mention, I have the BenQ projector. Paid about $1000 for it, and got a $400 replacement lamp for free.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

I will have to dig up pictures of our set up.

We have a frame built from standard PVC irrigation piping. It looks a little odd. And it sways a little if you bump the table. But it is extremely portable and easy to set up.

We thought it was going to be a temporarily measure. But we like it enough that we probably will not change it.

 

[DonTadow]

Cool, thanks - I'd appreciate it!

RE: Photoshop - If you create a circle and fade it out (and/or add a gradient effect) you can make some nifty light source effects.

Just to make sure I understand. Create a black circle in another layer and fade it out right? maybe add gradient, I'll practice it.

 

[DonTadow]

ok today at work i was searchingfor some more photoshop ideas when i came upon this program WOW!

Thats pretty much all I can say. Does exactly what photoshop does with one exception, I can have my own private view. Plus this thing has spell effects, numbers and resizes tokens automatically . Also has lightsource capable. I can't believe its open source. I"m really trying to find a downsize to this.

http://rptools.net/doku.php?id=home

 

[Hawkshere]

I've been watching this thread since it started in days of yore. I've considered this setup something that would have to wait until I upgraded from my condo to a large enough house to have a dedicated game room. However, a number of you have obviously been successful using angled wall or shelf mounted projection schemes, which has me rethinking my options.

A direct overhead solution simply won't work in my living room; I live in a nice but small 700 sq. ft. condo with a 15'x17' living room. This is where my gaming takes place, couch-style. When I use minis and a battlemat, I setup a card table in the center, or more often, just set it down in the floor, where everyone can see it from the casual seating.

Any projector arrangment I use here would be:

• Strictly setup & takedown in nature.
• Low footprint storage when not in use.

A little googling turned this up:
http://www.airdesks.com/projectorstand.asp

At 7' tall, I ought to be able to place this away from the seating, angle this thing almost straight down, get plently of throw distance to a floor (or coffee table) target, and still have less keystoning to correct than a wall mounted setup. Has anyone else tried something this?

 

[DonTadow]

I've been watching this thread since it started in days of yore. I've considered this setup something that would have to wait until I upgraded from my condo to a large enough house to have a dedicated game room. However, a number of you have obviously been successful using angled wall or shelf mounted projection schemes, which has me rethinking my options.

A direct overhead solution simply won't work in my living room; I live in a nice but small 700 sq. ft. condo with a 15'x17' living room. This is where my gaming takes place, couch-style. When I use minis and a battlemat, I setup a card table in the center, or more often, just set it down in the floor, where everyone can see it from the casual seating.

Any projector arrangment I use here would be:

• Strictly setup & takedown in nature.
• Low footprint storage when not in use.

A little googling turned this up:
http://www.airdesks.com/projectorstand.asp

At 7' tall, I ought to be able to place this away from the seating, angle this thing almost straight down, get plently of throw distance to a floor (or coffee table) target, and still have less keystoning to correct than a wall mounted setup. Has anyone else tried something this?

This looks ,great. I swear I kept looking for something like this but no luck. I am a little leary about the patent pending note though, other than that it looks like it will do the job.

I have an apartment probably a little smaller than yours and we purchased a wall mount that is not too distracting. We double it as the game projector and for movies and the big sunday game and/or race.

It all depends on presentation. The living room is our game room. But its also our living room six days a week. When we get done gaming we remove the blackout cloth from the table and angle the projector towards the wall.

 

[Hawkshere]

I didn't even see the patpend, but I usually ignore that stuff. People will try to patent anything. The way I saw it, if were much cheaper, I'd be suspicious of its contruction, but if it was much more, I'd be inclined to buld something from scratch. As it is, $200 is about what I'd expect to pay for a decent 7' stand, and the storage footprint is ideal (must fit in a small coat closet--with the coats, heh).

I don't know if Steel_Wind is still reading this thread, but the projectors discussed previously are now legacy models. The current attractive price/feature model from BenQ these days looks to be this:

http://www.projectorcentral.com/BenQ-MP620p.htm

..which can be had for $750.

 

[dorpond]

Wow, this is great!

I am glad to see that the game is actually being brought to a new level using electronic tools. Being a fellow gamer myself, I am always looking for better ways of making gaming better for the players and many of you have brought some very good ideas to surface here.

I am one of the team members over at rptools and I hope many of you have the opportunity to check out some of the tools we are making for the gaming community (and making for us too of course ). The tools that we develop are free and will remain free. We have tools that can help you keep track of initiative, roll dice, create monster/player tokens and my favorite - Maptool which allows you to do the very thing this thread is talking about and that is being able to play your games electronically across the world, project them, play on laptops or play on your High Def. television (like I do). Maptool is a virtual desktop application where you can load up your maps and play on them electronically.

Anyway, stop by and check us out! Tell us ways we can make the tools better for your gaming needs!

Dorpond
www.rptools.net

 

[GreatLemur]

c) Projector on the floor. Mirror on the floor. Players' feet and the dog on the floor...

Yeah, projecting up seems like a much better setup than projecting down, but this factor definitely worries me.

Ideally, I'd like to get a projector actually built into a table, but the most advanced carpentry project I've ever managed was a two-story rat condo. Maybe if I could just stick the projecter under a translucent table, and just build some kind of box thing around it to both hold it in place and protect it...

Or would that be too close to the tabletop? Is that the reason you had to use a mirror?