If you are using a front projection home theatre setup, determining the screen position is critical to a proper viewing experience.

There are two main things to consider:

• Screen / viewer distance
• Screen height position above ground

Screen height position above ground

The first rule is to place the center of your screen at the eye level of your viewer. So that is it? We are done? Well, not quite yet. We also have to make sure that the seating distance is correct with regard of the vertical size of the screen, using the same reasoning as we did in the previous section for the horizontal width of the screen.

The recommended maximal angle made by the line going from your eye to the top of the screen (while you are seated of course) is 35 degrees. More than this would cause neck strain. This means that for a 16:9 ratio screen 100 inches wide, the screen will be roughly 56 inches vertically. Let's do our math.

If the screen is centered at eye level, the minimal distance we must be to be less than 35 degrees from the top border of the 16:9 screen is 3.33 feet. We are thus still well under the limits if we remain between 5,7 and 18 feet as previously calculated. If we would be using a 4:3 screen, the minimal distance would be 4.5 feet. We are still fine at 5,6 feet and more. So as we have seen here, the most important is to consider the width of the screen in most cases.