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A night at the outdoor movies

 As I've said, I live in the Bay Area of California. So terrible weather isn't really an issue.. except when it gets really hot. It does rain here, but from October(If you are lucky) through to March and even then it isn't much or even that heavy. I must admit, it's kind of funny having grown up in the UK, I now miss rain!

Anyway, the combination of weather, Covid-19, having a very small social bubble and a large number of movies in my collection has meant that I have created an outdoor movie theatre at my house, on the front of my Garage.


I bought the following:

Projector



Budget forced me down certain routes. Still, I wasn't going to settle for anything. I'd say, though, that projectors are changing in technology and price so much at the moment that it is difficult to keep up. No matter what you buy, it seems within a few months you'll be able to buy something cheaper and/or more capable. 

In this case, the only thing I really compromised on was I did not get true 4K, although this projector can scale those movies. Still, it's not the same.

What was crucial here, though, was that the projector had to be bright. It seemed, from reading, that for outside use the projector had to be at least capable of 1,000 ANSI Lumens, and this one is 1350. Now, my screen is south facing, which isn't great for the Northern Hemisphere, but it does mean that I can use it from before sunset. Obviously, though it is better at night.

This projector also got some great reviews, which helped make the decision. There is an H3, but at the time of writing it is available in China only.

Issues

The projector is based on Android Open System Project (AOSP) which is, unfortunately, not the same as Android TV. This is not immediately obvious. If it were based on Android TV I might be able to control it using a homebridge plugin. 

I asked XGIMI about making the API available, and they refused. I even told them why, and they seem to have little interest. Their suggestion was to use a different, and newer, projector which does have AndroidTV but then that projector does not have the Lumens I need.

There is, though, an iPhone App to control the projector which communicates over Bluetooth.

Displaying through the projector

The projector is also advertised as supporting AirPlay 2 as a video destination and, certainly, it pretends to be an tv. It works just fine when I'm using it from my iPad to mirror my screen until I go into the tv+ app, in which case the screen mirroring on the projector crashes. I logged a bug on this in July, and 3 months later there is still not a fix. XGIMI, on Facebook, are insisting there'll be a new Firmware in late October... so we'll see. 

This then led me to purchase a HyperDrive USB-C Hub for iPad Pro so that I could connect my iPad Pro to the projector via HDMI whilst charging at the same time. Pretty much this works except the CBS All Access App, as I found out very recently.

Still.....

I'm actually quite happy with the projector. It mostly meets my requirements and I'm thinking of getting another tv to connect to it for showing video, which will mean that my only issue will be to turn it on and selected HDMI 1 as the input source. I'm actually thinking about a SwitchBot Bot for this, if I can get HomeKit support.

Sound

The projector itself has Harmon Karman speakers inside but, for outdoors, I'd say they aren't very good. I already had a HomePod in the garage, and so doubled up to add a 2nd one and create a stereo pair.

My speakers were, initially on shelves and a little into the garage itself, which muffled the sound a little, so I then purchased the Black Sesame HomePod Stands to bring them closer to the garage door itself. This vastly improved the sound. I just wish Apple made an outdoors version of the speaker, like there is an outdoors Sonos, so I could keep the garage door closed.

Now, with the release of the HomePod mini, I'd probably have 2 outdoor Sonos and a HomePod mini to give me the extra things such as Siri support, Intercom, etc.







Screen

The choice os screen was quite simple. I wanted an electric one that was designed for outdoors. I also wanted one that would work with 3D. I really wanted Passive 3D, but I was on a budget and so settled for Active 3D. I also wanted one that could be controlled remotely. There is no such thing as a HomeKit Projector Screen... but there could be, as you'll find out! This, then, led me down certain routes and this screen was on sale at the time.

Wiring up the Projector screen outdoors.


I already had an outdoors outlet in the garage wall, so it was just a question of extending the conduit further up the wall and installing another socket about half way up the garage door opening. From that I installed an idevices outdoor outlet and plugged the screen into one of the outlets, so I can turn it off when not being used.

The other socket is used for plugging in the extension cable to take power to the projector and iPad.

I would've liked the ability to control outlets individually, but it isn't much of an issue as I only use this when I'm doing the home cinema anyway.









Automation

I must admit, I was quite pleased with myself here. I used a Broadlink RM Pro to act as the remote control via integration with Homebridge and using the Broadlink RM plugin which can do many things, but here I decided to set up the project screen as a "window covering". The only gotcha here is that when you Open a window covering, you are usually putting it away, and when you close it, you usually obscure the window... for a projector screen, it is the opposite way around. That is Open is exposing teh screen, and closing it is putting it away. All this means is that with setting up the plugin, you just think the opposite to what it is designed for.

In my case, the settings look like the following:

{
    "platform": "BroadlinkRM",
    "name": "Broadlink RM",
    "hideWelcomeMessage": true,
    "hosts": [
        {
            "address": "192.168.1.247",
            "mac": "34:ea:34:89:13:5a",
            "isRFSupported": true
        }
    ],
    "accessories": [
        {
            "name": "Screen",
            "type": "window-covering",
            "totalDurationClose": 16,
            "totalDurationOpen": 15,
            "sendStopAt100": true,
            "data": {
                "open": "260084002a0f290f290f290f0f291027112711271027290f102811261127290f1028290f290f2a0e290f10272a0e290f290f10282a0e290f0f281028290f10270e2a290003ce2a0e290f290f290f10281027102810281027290f102811261127290f1028290f2a0e2a0e2a0e0e29290f2a0e2a0e0f29290f2a0e0e291127290f1028102729000d0500000000",
                "close": "2600c6002a0f2810281028100f290f290e290f290f280f2928100f290e2928100f292810281028100e292810281028100f29281028100f2928100e2928100f290e29280003cf28112711271028100f290f290e290f290f290e2928100f290e2928100f292810281028100e2a2711280f28100f29281028100f2928100e2928100f290f28280003d028102810281027110f280f290e290f290f290e2928100f290f2828100f292810281028100f292810281028100e29281028100f2928100e2928100f290f2829000d050000",
                "stop": "2600c6002a0f290f290f290f0e291028102710280f290f28102828100e2928100f292810281028100f290e29281028100f2a0e290e2928102810281028100e2a0e290f0003e828102810281028100e2a0e290f290e290f290f290e2928100f2928100e2928112810280f0f290f29281028100e290f290f292711280f290f28100f290f290e0003e82810290f281028100f290f280f290f290f280f290f2928100e2928100f292810281028100e290f29281028100e2a0e290f2928102810281028100e290f290f000d050000"
            }
        }
    ]
}

To give some context to this, it is not always required to give the MAC address and the IP address. The plugin will try to find the Broadlink. However, in my case it did not, so I had to find them from my networker router. Also, because it couldn't find them, I defined it as a permanent address in my DHCP table.

The next line "isRFSupported" was set to true because that is the communication method with the screen.

Next is the actual screen itself, which I imaginatively called screen. In HomeKit, I've since changed it to "projector screen". I've created it as a window covering.

"totalDurationClose" is how many seconds it takes to Close the screen (Go up in the case of a projector screen)

"totalDurationOpen" is how many seconds it takes to Open the screen (Go down). Now this is not how many seconds to all the way down, but to where you want it to stop. For my screen that was about 95% of the way down.

"sendStopAt100" is set to true because that is saying to send the stop command at 15 seconds, the value defined in "totalDurationOpen" and not let the screen open 100% of its capability. If you do want it to go to 100% of its capability, set this to false.

The next 3 items are actually the RF codes that need to be sent to the screen. The way you get those is to use the Broadlink app and the actual remote control and learn the codes. They actually appear in the status log for Homebridge and you cut and paste, making it much less daunting. I'd advise doing them one at a time, as otherwise it can become quite confusing.



Above is the relevant section of HomeKit.

I have 2 scenes, on of which is a favourite, and is what I use to make sure all doors are bolted and the garage door is closed at night, that being called "Good Night".

The other is called "Outdoor Movies", and when I click it, or say it with Siri, I get:




The Scene:

  • Turns the power on for the outdoor outlet
  • Opens the Garage Door
  • Opens the Projector Screen






























What I'd do differently with money as no object

  • A short throw 4K projector that I could integrate with HomeKit. Possibly the LG 4K Short throw, which runs WebOS and so could probably at least use the homebridge plugin.
  • Rear projection screen, so I could've had the projector permanently mounted inside the garage, and, as already said,
  • Sonos Outdoor Speakers with a HomePod mini
  • tv, but I'm going to wait for the long awaited one.

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