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Runco International is a subsidiary of Planar Systems, Inc., an American multinational corporation headquartered in Beaverton, Oregon, that manufactures a wide range of display devices.
Runco International was founded by Sam Runco with wife, Lori, in Northern California in 1987. He is a founding member of the Custom Electronic Design and Installation Association (CEDIA) and has also received the Lifetime Achievement Award] from CEDIA. Sam Runco has also been inducted into Dealerscope magazine's Hall Of Fame and for his contributions to the home theater industry.
The first Runco large screen projection system was introduced in 1970. Prior to the incorporation of Runco International, the company functioned as Runco Video. Cinemabeam was Runco Video's first projector to feature external convergence controls that allowed the video image to be projected onto large screens. Two years later, Runco magnified the image of a 15" television using a Fresnel lens to project it onto a wall, a turning point for large screen entertainment.
Runco International was incorporated in 1987 and launched the Runco International HT (Home Theater) video projector. As the home theater market expanded, the company acquired additional consumer electronics brands, including the Vidikron video display brand. By the early 1990s, Runco International had expanded its corporate offices in California, and developed worldwide distribution. It had become a popular brand of CRT projectors, selling models produced by other manufacturers such as Zenith Electronics, NEC, and Barco. [1]
Runco last recorded net sales as a private company of $54.6 million in the 12 months ending March 31, 2007. In May 2007, Runco was acquired by Planar Systems, Inc. Runco operations including product design, manufacturing, customer service, marketing and training teams were transitioned to Planar's headquarters located in Beaverton.
Digital cinema refers to the adoption of digital technology within the film industry to distribute or project motion pictures as opposed to the historical use of reels of motion picture film, such as 35 mm film. Whereas film reels have to be shipped to movie theaters, a digital movie can be distributed to cinemas in a number of ways: over the Internet or dedicated satellite links, or by sending hard drives or optical discs such as Blu-ray discs.
THX is a suite of high fidelity audiovisual reproduction standards for movie theaters, screening rooms, home theaters, computer speakers, video game consoles, car audio systems, and video games. The THX trailer that precedes movies is based on the Deep Note, with a distinctive glissando up from a rumbling low pitch.
IMAX is a proprietary system of high-resolution cameras, film formats, film projectors, and theaters known for having very large screens with a tall aspect ratio and steep stadium seating, with the 1.43:1 ratio format being available only in few selected locations.
A plasma display panel (PDP) is a type of flat panel display that uses small cells containing plasma: ionized gas that responds to electric fields. Plasma televisions were the first large flat panel displays to be released to the public.
Home cinema, also called home theaters or theater rooms, are home entertainment audio-visual systems that seek to reproduce a movie theater experience and mood using consumer electronics-grade video and audio equipment that is set up in a room or backyard of a private home. Some studies show films are rated better and generate more intense emotions when watched in a movie theater, however, convenience is a major appeal for home cinemas. In the 1980s, home cinemas typically consisted of a movie pre-recorded on a LaserDisc or VHS tape; a LaserDisc Player or VCR; and a heavy, bulky large-screen cathode ray tube TV set, although sometimes CRT projectors were used instead. In the 2000s, technological innovations in sound systems, video player equipment and TV screens and video projectors have changed the equipment used in home cinema set-ups and enabled home users to experience a higher-resolution screen image, improved sound quality and components that offer users more options. The development of Internet-based subscription services means that 2016-era home theatre users do not have to commute to a video rental store as was common in the 1980s and 1990s.
Display may refer to:
An LCD projector is a type of video projector for displaying video, images or computer data on a screen or other flat surface. It is a modern equivalent of the slide projector or overhead projector. To display images, LCD projectors typically send light from a metal-halide lamp through a prism or series of dichroic filters that separates light to three polysilicon panels – one each for the red, green and blue components of the video signal. As polarized light passes through the panels, individual pixels can be opened to allow light to pass or closed to block the light. The combination of open and closed pixels can produce a wide range of colors and shades in the projected image.
Anamorphic widescreen is a process by which a comparatively wide widescreen image is horizontally compressed to fit into a storage medium with a narrower aspect ratio, reducing the horizontal resolution of the image while keeping its full original vertical resolution. Compatible play-back equipment can then expand the horizontal dimension to show the original widescreen image. This is typically used to allow one to store widescreen images on a medium that was originally intended for a narrower ratio, while using as much of the frame – and therefore recording as much detail – as possible.
A video projector is an image projector that receives a video signal and projects the corresponding image on a projection screen using a lens system. Video projectors use a very bright ultra-high-performance lamp, Xenon arc lamp, LED or solid state blue, RB, RGB or remote fiber-optic RGB lasers to provide the illumination required to project the image, and most modern ones can correct any curves, blurriness, and other inconsistencies through manual settings. If a blue laser is used, a phosphor wheel is used to turn blue light into white light, which is also the case with white LEDs. A wheel is used in order to prolong the lifespan of the phosphor, as it is degraded by the heat generated by the laser diode. Remote fiber-optic RGB laser racks can be placed far away from the projector, and several racks can be housed in a single, central room. Each projector can use up to two racks, and several monochrome lasers are mounted on each rack, the light of which is mixed and transmitted to the projector booth using optical fibers. Projectors using RB lasers use a blue laser with a phosphor wheel in conjunction with a conventional solid state red laser.
Digital Light Processing (DLP) is a set of chipsets based on optical micro-electro-mechanical technology that uses a digital micromirror device. It was originally developed in 1987 by Larry Hornbeck of Texas Instruments. While the DLP imaging device was invented by Texas Instruments, the first DLP-based projector was introduced by Digital Projection Ltd in 1997. Digital Projection and Texas Instruments were both awarded Emmy Awards in 1998 for the DLP projector technology. DLP is used in a variety of display applications from traditional static displays to interactive displays and also non-traditional embedded applications including medical, security, and industrial uses.
Flicker is a visible change in brightness between cycles displayed on video displays. It applies to the refresh interval on cathode ray tube (CRT) televisions and computer monitors, as well as plasma computer displays and televisions.
Liquid-crystal-display televisions are television sets that use liquid-crystal displays to produce images. They are by far the most widely produced and sold television display type. LCD TVs are thin and light, but have some disadvantages compared to other display types such as high power consumption, poorer contrast ratio, and inferior color gamut.
Planar Systems, Inc. is an American digital display manufacturing corporation with a facility in Hillsboro, Oregon. Founded in 1983 as a spin-off from Tektronix, it was the first U.S. manufacturer of electroluminescent (EL) digital displays. Planar currently makes a variety of other specialty displays, and is an independent subsidiary of Leyard Optoelectronic Co. since 2015.The headquarters, leadership team and employees still remain in Hillsboro, Oregon.
An active shutter 3D system is a technique of displaying stereoscopic 3D images. It works by only presenting the image intended for the left eye while blocking the right eye's view, then presenting the right-eye image while blocking the left eye, and repeating this so rapidly that the interruptions do not interfere with the perceived fusion of the two images into a single 3D image.
Large-screen television technology developed rapidly in the late 1990s and 2000s. Prior to the development of thin-screen technologies, rear-projection television was standard for larger displays, and jumbotron, a non-projection video display technology, was used at stadiums and concerts. Various thin-screen technologies are being developed, but only liquid crystal display (LCD), plasma display (PDP) and Digital Light Processing (DLP) have been publicly released. Recent technologies like organic light-emitting diode (OLED) as well as not-yet-released technologies like surface-conduction electron-emitter display (SED) or field emission display (FED) are in development to replace earlier flat-screen technologies in picture quality.
"21:9" is a consumer electronics (CE) marketing term to describe the ultrawide aspect ratio of 64:27, designed to show films recorded in CinemaScope and equivalent modern anamorphic formats. The main benefit of this screen aspect ratio is a constant display height when displaying other content with a lesser aspect ratio.
4K resolution refers to a horizontal display resolution of approximately 4,000 pixels. Digital television and digital cinematography commonly use several different 4K resolutions. In television and consumer media, 3840 × 2160 is the dominant 4K standard, whereas the movie projection industry uses 4096 × 2160.
The graphics display resolution is the width and height dimension of an electronic visual display device, measured in pixels. This information is used for electronic devices such as a computer monitor. Certain combinations of width and height are standardized and typically given a name and an initialism which is descriptive of its dimensions. A graphics display resolution can be used in tandem with the size of the graphics display to calculate pixel density. An increase in the pixel density often correlates with a decrease in the size of individual pixels on a display.
Ultrawide formats refers to photos, videos, and displays with aspect ratios greater than 2. There were multiple moves in history towards wider formats, including one by Disney, with some of them being more successful than others.