1080UB Movies and Games

The Epson PowerLite Pro Cinema 1080UB was a pleasure to watch, and while I didn't include everything I watched in this review, I put forth many clips designed to show the detail evident in this revised projector.

HDTV: Las Vegas
Las Vegas is a very "red" show, but it also has the added benefit of putting out a ton of indoor material, varying from sparsely-lit offices to outdoor scenes on the Vegas Strip. I was able to capture a couple shots that showed off the deep black levels and also the rich saturation which this projector is more than capable of providing.

 
Rich colors, deep blacks make up the Las Vegas typical shots

HDTV: Rides
Rides had a unique show where they introduced the new Corvette Z06 along with the makers of the Corvette. Additionally, they showed off the new Corvette C6.R. This car is insane - 505 horsepower from a small block 8-cylinder engine that holds a combination of aluminum and titanium parts. Of course, what I liked was how awesome it looked in HD - even close up on a supersized projector screen.

 
I'll take two - they're small (block).

Xbox 360: Army of Two
Any time I can play a video game and call it "work" I'm all over it. I decided to put up some Army of Two action (with my trusty sidekick Tom Andry) and see how well the Epson handled fast-paced gaming action as well as the intensely dark scenes I knew AoT was capable of delivering. OK, so I probably played the game for 5 hours in order to snap a couple of cut scene shots, but it was worth it. The game looks great, and there's simply no avoiding the excellent dynamic range which is evident any time an explosion or shootout happens indoors. This game has plenty of content to deliver and it will eat up your display for all its worth. In this case, the Epson held on for the ride and came out looking pretty great.

 
Army of Two is butt-kick-a-liscious!

Xbox 360: Clive Barker's Jericho
This game is insane. It's very different from any other third person shooter I've ever played and the environments seem like they were pulled right out of the mind of a masterful horror story writer. Oh wait, they were. In fact, the storyline and voice acting are so convincing, it's hard not to get your pulse racing and find yourself looking deep into the dimmed corners in anticipation of the next strange creature to leap out at you from the darkness. Having a projector that can handle the deep dark areas really helps for games like this and I was thankful that Epson had both increased the lumen output of the project while at the same time making improvements to the LCD panels. The end result is more dynamic range - and this game used it all up.

Xbox 360: Turok
With a game like Turok - if you play this on an older projector you'll either be looking at a ridiculously over-bright picture where blacks are gray, or you'll see an occasional splotch of light in an otherwise sea of black. You're basically running around caves for the demo - trying to get out. Caves. Dark caves. With velociraptors hunting you down. Did I mention this is a dark game? Check out these pics:

 
Far from blotchy - that's detail in those shadows!