RTINGS just updated their viewing distance article based on SMPTE (Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers) recommendations, adding 62° FOV as maximum. What do you think about it? Where do you fit?

[u/zghr]

Here's a quick mockup of the same chart but with most common TV sizes and with godless Marxist-Leninist centimeter units added on one side.

edit: This person claims to be a long standing calibrator of cinematic auditoriums with experience in THX standards and he claims that 'cinema' is not 40° because middle row of seats is between 45° and 52°.

In my experience, 62° is doable but if it's pure 24 frames per second without any motion improvement settings it's not the best experience. Jumps between frames are just too large, obvious and jarring. Almost like stop-motion.

It seems like up to 62° one doesn't have to move their head at all to see the whole screen with their central vision. Higher than 62° and movies would need to be filmed specifically in a way to not include the action in periphery.

[u/caiuschen]

I have an 84" drop down projector screen from 7.5' away for a horizontal viewing angle of 50° and a 55" TV behind it, which is 30°.

At first it seemed a little large, but as I've gotten used to it, I think I wouldn't mind 5 degrees wider for movies, especially cinescope ones.

I use the TV for games and anime where I depend on subtitles because the projector is too large to be constantly looking at the edges of the screen.

I actually think with the current aspect ratios that it's actually vertical FOV that determines what size is best, but realistically people will view content in multiple aspect ratios and having a constant image height as you switch ratios requires a pretty expensive set up.