Why is laser speckle far more noticeable in IMAX Laser compared to Dolby Cinema ??

[Luca Mancini]

Been to a number of IMAX Laser(dual and single) and Dolby Cinema venues and the former always had noticeable speckle noise in bright scenes while it was basically non-existent in Dolby Cinema. Is it just Dolby using better projectors(Christie Eclipse i believe) compared to IMAX(Barco based) or something else ??

[James Gardiner]

My initial guess would be... As IMAX is using such large screens, and as such, higher screen gain. It unfortunately makes Speckle more noticeable.
I have not heard any indication that one company has better Speckle mitigation than the other.

[Marcel Birgelen]

Reasons why IMAX with Lasers looks like a unicorn has taken a giant dump all over the screen:

- Dolby Cinema uses standard, low gain white screens, IMAX uses highly reflective silver screens.
- Dolby Cinema uses physical actuators to shake the screen, IMAX uses an ultrasonic screen shaker system that apparently does little to hide speckle.

Reality: Digital IMAX just sucks, no matter if it's Xenon Laser Shark Tank aligned or Sharks with Laser Enabled.
And no, it isn't Barco's fault: I've seen Barco 6P setups on silver screens that show little to no speckle, but those screens use actuator-based screen shakers.

The modified Christie Eclipse projectors may be the "better" projectors, but at a giant cost in light efficientcy, compared to Barco's 6P setups.

[William Kucharski]

Reasons why IMAX with Lasers looks like a unicorn has taken a giant dump all over the screen:

ROTFL!!! Thanks for that one!!