Intro / Motivation

Over the past 8 months, I've been working on a larger project, far bigger than the projects I've worked on here. This is one that's been with me for even longer, far before I had the knowledge or confidence to try and do anything with this.

However, in the past few months, a wise man gave me some advice that finally got this project into motion. "If you didn't do something till you were ready, you'd never do anything". These words have stuck with me for a little now, and as such, I finally pushed myself to just get started. This is what brought Spectra to life.

Spectra is an experimental multi-projector cinema presentation concept I've been developing under Onyx Labs, a nonprofit organization that is (as of writing) still in formation. It's still an early project and very subject to change, but the goal was research, so I'm excited to finally have it to a point of being able to write about it.

Why I Started Building Spectra

Modern cinema projection technology has come a long way. Laser based lights, support for high frame rates, improved contrast, and formats like Dolby Vision, Dolby Atmos, and IMAX are incredible technology. However, even with all of that, one trend I noticed was one limitation that just kept cropping up:

If you want the extreme benefits of HDR, with good contrast and controlled brightness, you usually have to sacrifice resolution, uniformity, or motion fidelity.

This led to me asking the question of whether it was possible to build a system that could:

• Keep full 4K (or higher) resolution
• Use a multi-projector layout while avoiding typical issues like speckle, misalignment, difficult upkeep and maintenance, and artifacting
• Was able to get more out of HDR (peak brightness, contrast, detail in darkness, etc.) than what a single projection engine can accomplish
• Still reasonably fit inside a real theatre auditorium

Spectra is my attempt at trying to answer that question. It's not a final product or a format, it's rather just an idea that has been coming together into something a bit more structured.

What Spectra Actually Is

At its core, Spectra uses four synchronized projectors, each contributing a different "layer" to a complete image. These layers consist of:

• Primary Layer (PL) - This is the base image everything stacks on top of.
• High-Luminance Layer (HLL) - This boosts highlights without blowing out the rest of the image.
• Shadow Detail Layer (SDL) - Deepens contrast and adds detail to darker parts of the image.
• Chromatic Reinforcement Layer (CRL) - Adds color volume to the image, and helps reduce clipping in saturated areas.

The goal isn't necessary "more lumens", but rather to distribute light in ways single projection engines can't, to create a fuller picture, by focusing on spreading the work across four projectors, as opposed to pushing one engine to the limit.

This allows for HDR behavior more like what you'd expect from dual-layer displays or multi-stack LED walls, but applied to projection. It also creates an effect similar to the principles used in Dolby Cinema, but with four projection engines instead of two (or due to new upgrades, even a single engine in certain auditoriums).

The big challenges with this were primarily:

• Alignment tolerances
• Synchronization
• Noise and speckle interaction
• Mastering workflows
• Calibration cycles
• And ensuring everything blends properly

Slowly over the past little bit of time, I've been writing a whitepaper and technical specification to define how these layers work together, and how content would be mastered for them.

The Technical Approach (High-Level Overview)

While I won't be sharing the full whitepaper and specifications, at least for now, as it's very long and still being refined and worked on, the basic idea is pretty solid now. These are the basic ideas.

1. Multi-Projector HDR Stack

Instead of using one or two projectors to carry the full image, Spectra relies on a stack of four projectors, each displaying different layers to build the full image. Each layer is calibrated very precisely to ensure proper blending.

2. Per-Layer Luminance Control

Because each projector is designed to handle a different part of the HDR range, the system is able to control the luminance on a per-layer basis, allowing it to push extremely bright highlights, and while still keeping the blacks detailed and stable.

3. Color Management for Multi-Engine Systems

Spectra uses a custom pipeline (currently theoretical, pending review) that merges four output maps into one HDR "composite" image. The color processing is built around what is already physically possible with high-end laser projectors, not using impossible numbers.

4. Mastering Workflow

The mastering concept is similar to Dolby Vision's layer approach, but designed for theatrical projection, not TVs. With the Spectra workflow, artists would create a primary graded image, and then run it through Onyx Labs's proprietary conversion app, which breaks that down into the four image layers used in Spectra.

5. Synchronization and Alignment

To make this whole system work at all, all four projectors must stay locked with frame accurate sync, and precise overlay.

A process for this is outlined in the full spec and whitepaper, though this is one of the hardest technical parts, so details on this will not be shared till it can be externally validated.

A Real Use Case Example: Horror (and other shadow-heavy cinematography)

While this use case may sound niche, it is a real improvement that can be noticed in a lot of modern films, especially in horror, or other movies/genres that use shadows and darkness extensively.

Movies like Blumhouse's "Five Nights at Freddy's 2" (2025), Warner Bros. "It" (2017), or Blumhouse's "Black Phone 2" (2025) rely heavily on deep shadows and low-light to build suspense, tension, and fear. These scenes are so full of detail and atmosphere, however, with single projection engines stretching to cover the full color range, it's easy to have details in the dark be lost, with these engines struggling to recreate all this detail. Because of this, you can start to get issues like:

• Shadows turning into muddy, blocky sections
• Loss of fine gradients in dark areas
• Color drifting and tinting near-black
• Reduced readability of motion or silhouettes
• A general "it was too dark" experience

Spectra's design directly address this. The specific purpose of the Shadow Detail Layer is to stabilize and preserve details in low brightness areas of the screen without lifting the black floor. This helps Spectra maintain subtle separation of shapes and details, and keep gradients smooth, especially in scenes intended to be lit only by things like ambient moonlight, distant lamps, or dim flashlights.

This can provide massive benefits to horror movies, allowing the darkness to not just be a place on the screen where things disappear, but rather a more specific part that can be leveraged by filmmakers in more ways to enhance the atmosphere.

What I've Learned

This project has been pretty big, and it's helped me learn a lot of things. However, this project is still very early on in it's life span, as such I don't think I can reasonably fill out this section right now.

One thing I can safely say I've definitely learned is that when you work on a project as big as this, you eventually will hit a point where you need outside perspective. Sometimes just for feedback. Sometimes to make sure it's possible. It doesn't matter why, eventually you will. This however is not a problem for this project. It's the part that makes things more exciting, in this case.

Where Onyx Labs Comes In

Spectra is a big project. As such, while I'm working on it as an individual, I knew I needed to acknowledge the fact that this would need a proper home that could do more with it.

Onyx Labs is a nonprofit organization that I've had the idea for and wanted to form for a little while now. The goal of the organization has not shifted since it's original idea, and that has always been to build more user-friendly and more advanced cinema technology. This has been explored via a few ideas, such as more advanced accessibility hardware, new methods of DCP delivery, and now, Spectra.

This organization is early. Very, very, early. It hasn't even been officially formed yet, however, I'm working on this with the goal to achieve fiscal sponsorship by The Hack Foundation (d.b.a. Hack Club), via their HCB program.

Right now, this just serves for structure, and eventually, a proper way to be able to collaborate and scale.

Future Collaborations and Plans

Without going too deep into specifics, and without naming names, a fairly big company in the cinema technology space has expressed interest in discussing the specifications and whitepaper defined for Spectra with me, to provide feasibility, and that everything is possible as defined.

This is still extremely early stage stuff. Nothing is official, nothing is final, and nothing is set in stone to a point where I would feel confident sharing specifics, but it's getting there slowly, and I'm really proud of how it's gone so far.

Throughout 2026, I intend to share more details about specific parts as it's verified, and updated based on engineering feedback, however, I still wanted to release a write up now, just to show some of what's been going on behind the scenes, and as a sneak peek as to what may be on the horizon.

Final Thoughts

Spectra is by far, the biggest technical project I've ever attempted. It's ambitious, at times overwhelming, and full of problems I haven't yet worked out solutions for. However, I'm really proud of the progress so far, and I'm really excited to continue pushing this project forward.

While it's really ambitious, I will maintain the goal for a long while too eventually apply this to a real public auditorium where people will be able to experience movies. If by chance you're interested in more updates on the technical side, about the process of this development, or just wanting to follow general updates about Spectra, then feel free to stick around, as I intend to post more updates here as things progress throughout 2026.

For now, though, thank you so much for reading, and that's all from me. -- Heath Garvin / MinoDab492