Matte iMac
I've been looking into a good method to convert an iMac to a matte display.
First thing I have been looking at is simply applying a film to the iMac's outer glass, and I found several severe problems with this. The biggest problem is that the glass is too far from the panel to maintain a clear image when the film is applied. This results in a loss of focus. Another affect this causes is speckling, where the different colors of light end up being separated into little... umm specks. Matte projection TV's usually suffer from this.
I've been studying the build of a few different LCD displays I have lying around and I have some interesting observations about them.
Fist thing I immediately noticed was, that on all these displays the matte finish was simply a thin film applied directly to the glass. The film could be removed (not easily), thus making the display glossy. I'm guessing the matte finish is designed to protect the display and reinforce the glass. They use some very strong adhesive so I wouldn't recommend trying to remove it.
I'm guessing glossy displays also have a thin layer of film on them for reinforcement. Has anyone pulled the glass off their iMac and had a good look? I'm wondering if there is something on the glass. If not, maybe giving it a high quality matte finish would be fairly simple. Then the only hurdle would be replacing the glass bezel with something.
First thing I have been looking at is simply applying a film to the iMac's outer glass, and I found several severe problems with this. The biggest problem is that the glass is too far from the panel to maintain a clear image when the film is applied. This results in a loss of focus. Another affect this causes is speckling, where the different colors of light end up being separated into little... umm specks. Matte projection TV's usually suffer from this.
I've been studying the build of a few different LCD displays I have lying around and I have some interesting observations about them.
Fist thing I immediately noticed was, that on all these displays the matte finish was simply a thin film applied directly to the glass. The film could be removed (not easily), thus making the display glossy. I'm guessing the matte finish is designed to protect the display and reinforce the glass. They use some very strong adhesive so I wouldn't recommend trying to remove it.
I'm guessing glossy displays also have a thin layer of film on them for reinforcement. Has anyone pulled the glass off their iMac and had a good look? I'm wondering if there is something on the glass. If not, maybe giving it a high quality matte finish would be fairly simple. Then the only hurdle would be replacing the glass bezel with something.
Comments
This is the iMac... very blurry with the film
Excellent research/experimentation, by the way, very much appreciated.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cy0o2WdrN3M
You can see the difference immediately when it's removed and you can see the glare on the glass panel itself separate from the iMac. Ideally, a 3rd party manufacturer would just make a plastic sheet or something with a magnetic border to protect the screen.
You can probably make one yourself.
You can get cheap suction cups on eBay to remove the glass if you don't have one.
Removing the glass should go a long way to fixing the glare:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cy0o2WdrN3M
You can see the difference immediately when it's removed and you can see the glare on the glass panel itself separate from the iMac. Ideally, a 3rd party manufacturer would just make a plastic sheet or something with a magnetic border to protect the screen.
You can probably make one yourself.
You can get cheap suction cups on eBay to remove the glass if you don't have one.
Cool video. That's the '07 iMac, seems like I recall from the iFixit tear down (of the 27", at least) that they declared the LCD panel itself to be "very glossy" ("It's great for spying on those behind you, as well as watching movies").
Hard to tell from the accompanying picture just how glossy that is:
If the glass of the LCD is fully exposed, then its really easy to just stick some matte film on there. If there is a coating then it would depend on the thickness of that coating. Even then maybe a high quality film would work.
Cool video. That's the '07 iMac, seems like I recall from the iFixit tear down (of the 27", at least) that they declared the LCD panel itself to be "very glossy" ("It's great for spying on those behind you, as well as watching movies").
Hard to tell from the accompanying picture just how glossy that is:
Weird, cause that almost looks matte to me. They must have very soft lighting. The panel itself appears to be a fair bit less glossy then the outer glass. I don't see any edges where the film would be on the outside. If only I could get a high res photo.
Weird, cause that almost looks matte to me. the panel itself must be a fair bit less glossy then the outer glass. I don't see any edges where the film would be on the outside. If only I could get a high res photo.
It does, doesn't it? But of course we don't know how they lit that shot; with the right lights and camera angle you could make the display with the glass still on look matte.
I've been looking into a good method to convert an iMac to a matte display.
Hello first post here so bare with me. I too am in the "November" queue for a 27" quad core. I'm also a long time, mac based graphic artist so I'm familiar with the glossy or matte conflict.
It might scare me to attempt this but has anyone else tried to replace the glass with something else. I recently framed an Illustration for a Silent Auction with "Museum Glass". Have you seen this stuff? Its pretty amazing. Surreal almost in that in a room with many bright lights it can look as if there is no glass at all. It makes you want to touch the framed piece because the clarity makes you think there is just no glass. The piece of glass I bought was 18" x 24" for about 50 bucks. It is treated on one side. Hard to tell but you can scratch an edge to see which side is treated. That side would face the art (or LED in this case). Of course I'd imagine it's thinner that the iMac glass so not as durable but I would think this stuff on a designer's iMac would be a dream. Its not "matte" but this stuff seems to all but eliminate glare.
A little information about how Museum Glass works here: http://www.tru-vue.com/Tru-Vue/Products/33/
I don't how you'd install this with bezel and other issues but I'd love to see if it would work. Any thoughts?
Hello first post here so bare with me. I too am in the "November" queue for a 27" quad core. I'm also a long time, mac based graphic artist so I'm familiar with the glossy or matte conflict.
It might scare me to attempt this but has anyone else tried to replace the glass with something else. I recently framed an Illustration for a Silent Auction with "Museum Glass". Have you seen this stuff? Its pretty amazing. Surreal almost in that in a room with many bright lights it can look as if there is no glass at all. It makes you want to touch the framed piece because the clarity makes you think there is just no glass. The piece of glass I bought was 18" x 24" for about 50 bucks. It is treated on one side. Hard to tell but you can scratch an edge to see which side is treated. That side would face the art (or LED in this case). Of course I'd imagine it's thinner that the iMac glass so not as durable but I would think this stuff on a designer's iMac would be a dream. Its not "matte" but this stuff seems to all but eliminate glare.
A little information about how Museum Glass works here: http://www.tru-vue.com/Tru-Vue/Products/33/
I don't how you'd install this with bezel and other issues but I'd love to see if it would work. Any thoughts?
Thats a good idea, however I would have to wonder how it would preform over a backlit display. It appears that from its description this glass is designed to protect the material underneath from UV, while preventing reflections from outside light sources. I'd have to wonder what would happen if the light source was behind the glass.
It appears from the description that both sides are coated, but only one side has a UV coating. Very interesting.
The other challenge would be figuring out how to cut the glass with curved edges.
Hey, there's a distributor right in my city.
Hard to tell from the accompanying picture just how glossy that is
It doesn't look that bad when they tilt the display but they will have really diffused studio lighting:
I've seen pictures of glossy panels on their own and they do have some reflections but most of the glare is from the glass, which is why the anti-glare MBP doesn't have the glass.
The 2007 model had a glossy panel too. If you look at these images, you can see the reflection in the last image to the right of the panel:
http://www.kodawarisan.com/imac_2007...07_mid_01.html
but it doesn't look nearly as bad relative to the top ones with the glass in front. The anti-glare MBP has the glass removed and a coating on the panel, which is the ideal.
It would be interesting if applying a matte coating to the inside of the glass as you suggested would work. So long as heat inside the machine didn't affect the adhesive.
It would be interesting if applying a matte coating to the inside of the glass as you suggested would work. So long as heat inside the machine didn't affect the adhesive.
I don't think this would be a good idea guys, the point is to reduce reflections coming off of the outside of the glass. All this would do is reduce the picture quality while doing nothing to the reflective surface.
It doesn't look that bad when they tilt the display but they will have really diffused studio lighting:
I've seen pictures of glossy panels on their own and they do have some reflections but most of the glare is from the glass, which is why the anti-glare MBP doesn't have the glass.
The 2007 model had a glossy panel too. If you look at these images, you can see the reflection in the last image to the right of the panel:
http://www.kodawarisan.com/imac_2007...07_mid_01.html
but it doesn't look nearly as bad relative to the top ones with the glass in front. The anti-glare MBP has the glass removed and a coating on the panel, which is the ideal.
It would be interesting if applying a matte coating to the inside of the glass as you suggested would work. So long as heat inside the machine didn't affect the adhesive.
Most of the reflection comes from the outer glass. The inner glass will have some kind of protective coating which will absorb some of the reflection. If you look closely, at an angle at the iMac when its turned off you can see the reflection on the outer glass and reflection off the panel itself kinda like a double image.
It would be pointless to have a matte display under the glass because you would be combining the disadvantages of matte with the disadvantages of glossy. Thats why my original thoughts were to remove the glass altogether and replace it with some sort of frame, and apply a matte film to the LCD itself. This museum glass looks like another interesting option too.
I don't how you'd install this with bezel and other issues but I'd love to see if it would work. Any thoughts?
Yes. Contact that company and talk to them about it. In this economy finding a new market is probably not a bad thing even assuming Apple eventually ships a matte version.
1 Removing the glass reduces all reflection by at least %50 ... maybe %65 to %75
2 The guide pins that are welded to the metal frame that go around the glass break of really easily...
I think its actually a good thing I found this out. It appears they are attached poorly. If I had not removed the glass that metal piece could have fallen into the computer at some point. I think loose metal bits are not good for computers.
I think having the glass in front of glass doubles the reflection because light refracts off of each, and that combined light doubles the reflection you see. What I'm curious about is if adding anti-reflective glass would help cancel out the reflections underneath. At least I know for a fact it would be a noticeable improvement.
Yes. Contact that company and talk to them about it. In this economy finding a new market is probably not a bad thing even assuming Apple eventually ships a matte version.
BDBLACK, you have a good point about the display being backlit so the Museum Glass may not work its magic the same way as its intended use. The obvious first step would be to simply hold the Museum Glass over the display. If it makes a noticeable difference then maybe it would be worth further and more significant efforts. I guess I could run over to the Apple Store and test a piece of the glass this way but alas, I'll probably just wait until (whenever in) November. Hopefully someone else here will beat me to it and have this all figured out by that time.
http://s1.guide-images.ifixit.com/ig...up2klgwp6.huge
On another note, has anyone seen that YouTube video of the guy who takes his iMac glass cover off with a toilet plunger? It's pretty cool, all recorded with the iSight camera on the iMac. Take care!
Jim