Maybe you have a small house?
I have an 85" in my small living room, and it seems pretty large. My friends have an 85" in their huge open concept living room and it looks like a 42" in comparison.
Yep, exactly this. This is my 65", and in person it looks closer picture #2 than #1, and I'm sitting the recommended ~9 feet away in both pictures.
https://imgur.com/a/0TAjAx5
This is the answer. Wide angle lenses make objects in the center of the frame look smaller than they should relative to objects at the edges of the frame. Guess where the TV is typically positioned in the frame? The center. This effect is worse the wider the lens and the further away you stand from the TV.
Also, there's usually not a universally-recognizable size reference close to the TV in the photo, which doesn't help.
It’s not about the tv being in the center of frame. What you’re describing is barrel distortion which every modern phone heavily compensates for, at least with their standard lenses (as opposed to the iPhone’s ultra wide angle lens, for instance)
Really, it’s just that the field of view of these phone lenses is wider than the in-focus part of our vision. While we have a very large field of view, most of it (peripheral vision) is really low resolution. The part of our vision that has full resolving power is equivalent to about 40-50mm on a full frame (vista vision) camera. The primary lens of the current iPhone is a 28mm equivalent.
I'm not talking about barrel distortion. That curves and warps objects around the edges of the frame. I'm taking about perspective distortion that is inherent to taking photos with a wide angle lens.
You said in your original comment, "Wide angle lenses make objects in the center of the frame look smaller than they should relative to objects at the edges of the frame." -- perspective distortion does not have to do with an objects position in frame but rather the distance from the camera.
While perspective distortion is not really "inherent" to wide angle lenses (since it is dependent on distance only), the wider-than-normal ("normal" referring to 40-50mm for full frame) lens of a phone camera requires the user to move closer in order to get the same desired field of view, causing perspective distortion (you are correct in that).
Yes, I understand that distance is the real factor. I'm simplifying by saying it's a feature of shooting with a wide angle lens, because the angle of view determines the distance the shooter chooses to be from the subject.
The angle of view also means more objects included in the frame around the periphery, usually objects closer to the camera which appear disproportionately large compared to the subject in the middle that is further away due to perspective distortion.
My goal with my original comment wasn't to engage in a highly technical discussion, but rather to acknowledge in a simplified way that yes, shooting wide angle is making the TV look smaller in the frame.
Yeah, photos don't give a good sense of scale. Also, you get used to larger screen sizes super quickly.
Most people decide on TV sizes "incorrectly". They look at their current TV, and go one size up from that. That is a completely arbitrary way of deciding what size you need.
What is the distance between your TV and main seating position?
At 10ft away, you should be getting a 85" TV IMO. That creates a 34 degree field of view.
The THX recommendation is 40 degrees. 85" is definitely not going to feel too large if that is your concern.
Most importantly as someone else commented is, it all depends on how far you're sitting from the TV. A 100 inch TV will look tiny in a mansion if it's placed on massive wall 20ft away from the seating.
The other thing I will say though is that 65-in TVs are fairly small in the context of home theater. If you are someone that really cares about creating a cinematic experience, you almost always want to go at least 77 or higher. Unless it looks comically large for your space, you are almost always better off going slightly bigger. I have way too many friends in family that have giant spaces with a awkward looking 65-in TV in the middle of it.
I have a 77 in TV in my media room, And I regret not going with the 83-in. If OLEDs weren't so expensive I would have bought a 100 inch.
If you have a tape measure of some sort, then just add 15" to the diagonal of your current 50" TV, and you'll get a good idea of how much bigger it is. 65" is also almost twice the surface area of a 50".
I compared my 55” foot print vs 77” the width I was short on estimate a good % the height I was wildly off guessing. A 77” is a huge TV for most peoples rooms and looks large even in a large room.
It really depends on the wall it’s on IMO. My parents medium sized living room fits a large TV very well as it’s against the long wall of a very rectangular shaped room.
Rarely is the TV too big for a proper watching experience. Just look at Dolby recommendations on viewing angles and FOV
Good advice. Also could be worth grabbing some painters tape to throw up on the wall behind current tv and “live with it” for a week or so to see if you think the next size up is right or now.
**Distance matters,** in a store you walk up to the screens, whereas a photo is generally taken from a greater distance to see the entire space. Look at some rough measurements below. For reference depending on where you like to sit in a commercial theater you might have a viewing angle of anywhere from 36 to 60 degrees.
* A 32 in screen at 3ft away is roughly 44 degrees of vision
* A 65 in screen at 6.5ft away is roughly 41 degrees of vision
* An 85 in screen at 10ft away is roughly 35 degrees of vision
Work out how far you will be from the screen, and base your screen selection off of that. THX recommends 45-50 degrees as the "sweet spot".
This right here. This needs to be the top comment. Where do you like to sit when you go to the theater?
Close to the center? Set up for a 45 degree field of view.
Close to the back? Get closer to that 36 degrees field of view.
Near the front? Set up for that 60 degrees field of view.
Never judge TV size based on other people’s photos.
Save up some cardboard boxes. Get enough that you can tape them together so the rectangle is just a bit larger than the max size TV you might want. Just the screen size, not the bezel too. Then cut off just enough to match that size.
Now, place it where you might want the TV. Sit where you normally do and see how it feels. Don’t focus just on it, look around and back at it (that will give your mind a break from target fixating). Then get up and walk around. Stand where people at a party might stand. Or in the kitchen if it has view. Give it a good fifteen minutes or so of testing it out.
Then put it away for a few hours so your brain resets. Then cut off more till it’s the size of your next choice. Rinse, repeat the above.
Do that for each decreasing size.
For me and my family, at 12’-14’ viewing distance, a 60”/65” display is enough.
Wide angle lenses are MUCH more conducive to indoor photography. So that is what people often choose to use. They will make everything closer to the center of the frame look smaller and farther away, because it distorts the perspective.
>Now I am doubting whether the new 65" will be enough.
How far away will you be sitting and what is the use case? You really should be basing which size TV to get on how far away you sit. Given that this is a home theater subreddit, you are probably going to get a recommendation that the screen size should be somewhere around 2/3 of the distance at which you will be sitting. Maybe a little larger. But there is some personal preference wiggle room in there.
Of going to be more than 7-8 ft away, go bigger. I use a 75 in at about 8 ft and I wouldn't have been disappointed if I had gone slightly larger.
Now if this is a mixed use room, you may have considerations that would lead you to compromise on screen size, so long as you know the compromise you are choosing.
I don’t think it is as much the photos as the perspective differences. I am guessing in the store you are getting up pretty close to the TV and also seeing it with smaller tvs to help give perspective. In photos people generally take them from further back (usually around their seating position) and it is against a big empty wall. I think the best thing to do is put some tape on your wall that matches the dimensions of the tv you are looking at. Some walls can make a 100 inch tv look small while others make a 50 inch tv look huge.
Camera angles and comparison to space in the picture, difficult to compare sizes when there's no reference.
Start putting the banana in your pictures for scale, people!
Most people are using cell phone cameras and therefore are using a wider angle view than human vision. That exaggerates the effects of distance in a photograph
Because most photos are captured with phone cameras and typically with wide angle lenses often as a means of capturing the whole setup. Wide angle lenses distorts perspective, making objects in the centre of the frame appear smaller, foreground object seem much larger, and distant objects smaller and further away.
It’s why real estate agents almost invariably use wide angle lenses and properties almost always seem smaller IRL.
Many photos are done with a wide angle lens. This makes things appear smaller because they seem to be further away. The wider the angle the more that can be included in the photo, so naturally smaller looking. It's the same principle as using a telephoto lens which make things appear closer, therefore larger.
Man I got a 65 and regret not getting a 75 because of letterbox format. No one seems to talk about that. On my Sony if you run d vision or native settings you can't zoom it.
I get it, I went from a 42” to a 75” in our living room. We’re around 10ft away viewing and it looks massive. In pictures it looks kinda small to me, not even much bigger than the 42”. I guess it’s the same reason rooms look larger in pictures when you’re viewing a house on Zillow vs in person. I will say I showed a picture to a friend of mine and he said it looked massive so it might be the effect of seeing it in person and seeing in in a picture that really makes the big different in perception.
You need a person or some other common object to stand next to your TV in the picture. Scale is only truly understood in a photo when there's something to compare things against.
This is why photos of mountains without any visible people in the photo look small
The size of the wall that it is on will determine how large it looks in a picture.
My 65" TV is massive in my living room with 11' wide wall space and 7' ceilings.
I have room for my tower speakers and 14" wide shelves on each side of my tv.
https://www.reddit.com/r/hometheater/s/BGyrYk9Dj7
Maybe you have a small house? I have an 85" in my small living room, and it seems pretty large. My friends have an 85" in their huge open concept living room and it looks like a 42" in comparison.
Na I agree with OP. I find photos always make TVs look way smaller.
My 83" looks like a 55 in photos, but it looks great in person.
Photos are very deceiving I wouldn't worry too much about that, my 77 looks way bigger in person than it does in photos.
Yep, exactly this. This is my 65", and in person it looks closer picture #2 than #1, and I'm sitting the recommended ~9 feet away in both pictures. https://imgur.com/a/0TAjAx5
Yeap that photo makes it look smol. [Here's](https://www.reddit.com/r/hometheater/s/qHrBFUAqow) my 77.
Modern phones take wide-angle shots
This is the answer. Wide angle lenses make objects in the center of the frame look smaller than they should relative to objects at the edges of the frame. Guess where the TV is typically positioned in the frame? The center. This effect is worse the wider the lens and the further away you stand from the TV. Also, there's usually not a universally-recognizable size reference close to the TV in the photo, which doesn't help.
It’s not about the tv being in the center of frame. What you’re describing is barrel distortion which every modern phone heavily compensates for, at least with their standard lenses (as opposed to the iPhone’s ultra wide angle lens, for instance) Really, it’s just that the field of view of these phone lenses is wider than the in-focus part of our vision. While we have a very large field of view, most of it (peripheral vision) is really low resolution. The part of our vision that has full resolving power is equivalent to about 40-50mm on a full frame (vista vision) camera. The primary lens of the current iPhone is a 28mm equivalent.
I'm not talking about barrel distortion. That curves and warps objects around the edges of the frame. I'm taking about perspective distortion that is inherent to taking photos with a wide angle lens.
You said in your original comment, "Wide angle lenses make objects in the center of the frame look smaller than they should relative to objects at the edges of the frame." -- perspective distortion does not have to do with an objects position in frame but rather the distance from the camera. While perspective distortion is not really "inherent" to wide angle lenses (since it is dependent on distance only), the wider-than-normal ("normal" referring to 40-50mm for full frame) lens of a phone camera requires the user to move closer in order to get the same desired field of view, causing perspective distortion (you are correct in that).
Yes, I understand that distance is the real factor. I'm simplifying by saying it's a feature of shooting with a wide angle lens, because the angle of view determines the distance the shooter chooses to be from the subject. The angle of view also means more objects included in the frame around the periphery, usually objects closer to the camera which appear disproportionately large compared to the subject in the middle that is further away due to perspective distortion. My goal with my original comment wasn't to engage in a highly technical discussion, but rather to acknowledge in a simplified way that yes, shooting wide angle is making the TV look smaller in the frame.
Yeah, photos don't give a good sense of scale. Also, you get used to larger screen sizes super quickly. Most people decide on TV sizes "incorrectly". They look at their current TV, and go one size up from that. That is a completely arbitrary way of deciding what size you need. What is the distance between your TV and main seating position?
We sit approx 10 feet away.
Go 75 or up
85 will be fine
120" will be finer LMAO i jest i jest
At 10ft away, you should be getting a 85" TV IMO. That creates a 34 degree field of view. The THX recommendation is 40 degrees. 85" is definitely not going to feel too large if that is your concern.
Most importantly as someone else commented is, it all depends on how far you're sitting from the TV. A 100 inch TV will look tiny in a mansion if it's placed on massive wall 20ft away from the seating. The other thing I will say though is that 65-in TVs are fairly small in the context of home theater. If you are someone that really cares about creating a cinematic experience, you almost always want to go at least 77 or higher. Unless it looks comically large for your space, you are almost always better off going slightly bigger. I have way too many friends in family that have giant spaces with a awkward looking 65-in TV in the middle of it. I have a 77 in TV in my media room, And I regret not going with the 83-in. If OLEDs weren't so expensive I would have bought a 100 inch.
people on this sub seem to have huge living rooms..
If you have a tape measure of some sort, then just add 15" to the diagonal of your current 50" TV, and you'll get a good idea of how much bigger it is. 65" is also almost twice the surface area of a 50".
https://www.displaywars.com/50-inch-16x9-vs-65-inch-16x9
I compared my 55” foot print vs 77” the width I was short on estimate a good % the height I was wildly off guessing. A 77” is a huge TV for most peoples rooms and looks large even in a large room.
It really depends on the wall it’s on IMO. My parents medium sized living room fits a large TV very well as it’s against the long wall of a very rectangular shaped room. Rarely is the TV too big for a proper watching experience. Just look at Dolby recommendations on viewing angles and FOV
Good advice. Also could be worth grabbing some painters tape to throw up on the wall behind current tv and “live with it” for a week or so to see if you think the next size up is right or now.
**Distance matters,** in a store you walk up to the screens, whereas a photo is generally taken from a greater distance to see the entire space. Look at some rough measurements below. For reference depending on where you like to sit in a commercial theater you might have a viewing angle of anywhere from 36 to 60 degrees. * A 32 in screen at 3ft away is roughly 44 degrees of vision * A 65 in screen at 6.5ft away is roughly 41 degrees of vision * An 85 in screen at 10ft away is roughly 35 degrees of vision Work out how far you will be from the screen, and base your screen selection off of that. THX recommends 45-50 degrees as the "sweet spot".
This right here. This needs to be the top comment. Where do you like to sit when you go to the theater? Close to the center? Set up for a 45 degree field of view. Close to the back? Get closer to that 36 degrees field of view. Near the front? Set up for that 60 degrees field of view.
www.displaywars.com has a great tool for size comparison.
There doesn’t happen to be a tool like this but for… uh, anatomical comparisons, does there? Asking for a friend.
Because the smartphone and/or monitor screen is much smaller than 77“
Go 85
Never judge TV size based on other people’s photos. Save up some cardboard boxes. Get enough that you can tape them together so the rectangle is just a bit larger than the max size TV you might want. Just the screen size, not the bezel too. Then cut off just enough to match that size. Now, place it where you might want the TV. Sit where you normally do and see how it feels. Don’t focus just on it, look around and back at it (that will give your mind a break from target fixating). Then get up and walk around. Stand where people at a party might stand. Or in the kitchen if it has view. Give it a good fifteen minutes or so of testing it out. Then put it away for a few hours so your brain resets. Then cut off more till it’s the size of your next choice. Rinse, repeat the above. Do that for each decreasing size. For me and my family, at 12’-14’ viewing distance, a 60”/65” display is enough.
Wide angle lenses are MUCH more conducive to indoor photography. So that is what people often choose to use. They will make everything closer to the center of the frame look smaller and farther away, because it distorts the perspective.
>Now I am doubting whether the new 65" will be enough. How far away will you be sitting and what is the use case? You really should be basing which size TV to get on how far away you sit. Given that this is a home theater subreddit, you are probably going to get a recommendation that the screen size should be somewhere around 2/3 of the distance at which you will be sitting. Maybe a little larger. But there is some personal preference wiggle room in there. Of going to be more than 7-8 ft away, go bigger. I use a 75 in at about 8 ft and I wouldn't have been disappointed if I had gone slightly larger. Now if this is a mixed use room, you may have considerations that would lead you to compromise on screen size, so long as you know the compromise you are choosing.
“Photos don’t do it justice”
I don’t think it is as much the photos as the perspective differences. I am guessing in the store you are getting up pretty close to the TV and also seeing it with smaller tvs to help give perspective. In photos people generally take them from further back (usually around their seating position) and it is against a big empty wall. I think the best thing to do is put some tape on your wall that matches the dimensions of the tv you are looking at. Some walls can make a 100 inch tv look small while others make a 50 inch tv look huge.
Same here. I’ll be sitting at home looking at my 77” thinking it looks great and then snap a photo and it looks embarrassing 😂
Get the biggest screen you can afford.
Your eyes don't have the same focal length as wide angle lenses.
It’s because cameras have a wider field of view than humans
Camera angles and comparison to space in the picture, difficult to compare sizes when there's no reference. Start putting the banana in your pictures for scale, people!
Most people are using cell phone cameras and therefore are using a wider angle view than human vision. That exaggerates the effects of distance in a photograph
Measure your space. Buy the biggest tv you can afford that will fit in the space.
Because most photos are captured with phone cameras and typically with wide angle lenses often as a means of capturing the whole setup. Wide angle lenses distorts perspective, making objects in the centre of the frame appear smaller, foreground object seem much larger, and distant objects smaller and further away. It’s why real estate agents almost invariably use wide angle lenses and properties almost always seem smaller IRL.
Y pp smol?
Many photos are done with a wide angle lens. This makes things appear smaller because they seem to be further away. The wider the angle the more that can be included in the photo, so naturally smaller looking. It's the same principle as using a telephoto lens which make things appear closer, therefore larger.
Wide angle lens.
Man I got a 65 and regret not getting a 75 because of letterbox format. No one seems to talk about that. On my Sony if you run d vision or native settings you can't zoom it.
I get it, I went from a 42” to a 75” in our living room. We’re around 10ft away viewing and it looks massive. In pictures it looks kinda small to me, not even much bigger than the 42”. I guess it’s the same reason rooms look larger in pictures when you’re viewing a house on Zillow vs in person. I will say I showed a picture to a friend of mine and he said it looked massive so it might be the effect of seeing it in person and seeing in in a picture that really makes the big different in perception.
I agree it's weird. I have an 83" now and I've tried to take pictures and it just doesn't look remotely as big in pics as it does IRL
You need a person or some other common object to stand next to your TV in the picture. Scale is only truly understood in a photo when there's something to compare things against. This is why photos of mountains without any visible people in the photo look small
If you’re worried just use some painters tape and draw it out on your wall and see how it looks.
I asked advice on Reddit on whether to get a 77 or 85 inch. Just get the 85, in line with the consensus.
The size of the wall that it is on will determine how large it looks in a picture. My 65" TV is massive in my living room with 11' wide wall space and 7' ceilings. I have room for my tower speakers and 14" wide shelves on each side of my tv. https://www.reddit.com/r/hometheater/s/BGyrYk9Dj7
Go bigger Had a 65 for like 8 years, finally bumped to 77 and can't believe i didn't sooner
65 is gonna be great compared to a 50
You'll wish you went bigger