50 inch high? Do you mean wide? Due to our physiology of two horizontal eyes, we're more suited for a wide screen than one that high. I'm not convinced your field of view could even s make use of an entire 50 inch high screen at that distance.
Humans have almost 180 degrees field of view horizontally and 135 degrees vertically. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Field_of_view) Wide screen makes more sense. Put two browsers next to each other on a wide screen and you're no longer have the empty bands shown in the article.
If you need to see more vertical real estate on a site use a higher resolution monitor or a larger one. Biology gave us a wide screen field of view. Use it.
You don’t need a large FOV for movie viewing. Even if it were only 60°, you’d be able see a 2 meter wide screen at a distance of 2 meters (and that’s measuring that distance to the edges of that screen; its center would be about 15% closer)
You don't want / need to cover your full field of vision. A 400 x 200 pixel display that covers 2-3% of your field of view and an unobtrusive system to get it there close to perfect for this kind of thing. Otherwise I might as well just look at a screen.
Having a bigger, further away screen may prove to help prevent myopia, though. Eyes focused on near objects all the time tend to go myopic. I'm not sure a few extra feet is that significant though, compared to looking out a window at the hills or clouds.
Suppose your desk is 36" deep. A 48" wide screen at the back of it occupies 41 degrees of your world. The THX recommendation for cinema is 40 degrees. This is as immersive as you're going to get without strapping a screen to your head.
20/20 vision is about 60 pixels per degree, depending on which study you want to believe. 41x60 is 2460 pixels across -- you've already reached the max required pixels with a 3840x2160 display.
I wonder if you'd be better off using a larger monitor (with or without a higher resolution) further away from you physically, so that it covers the same visual angle as your smaller monitor.
Something with focusing on near/far objects maybe?
This one, the 43", about 1.7m. So I a 50" would be about 2m away, but even more cumbersome to transport. This would give the same working area as a 25" @ 1m. The difference between focusing at 1m vs 2m is significant, it's the difference between 1 diopter and 0.5 diopter of accomodation for your eye (vs about 2 diopter working at 50cm on a laptop, or probably 3 on phone). I don't know how that relates to muscle tension or eye fluid pressure. Working all day on the 43" my eyes get a little 'cramped', but it's a world better still. I also experimented with projectors, doable, but they can have other issues, some make lots of heat or noise, or others have a soft image.
Yeah but we're talking about computer screens, not televisions. The viewing distance is around 20-30 inches and 100DPI definitely does not cut it at that distance.
To be fair to the poster, we have in general horizontally distributed eyes. Yes the display is squarish, so the focus uses similar distances, but maybe the game of peripheral vision gives the L?R space some advantage.
All true, but worth a brief addition: these viewing distance / screen size / resolution models all assume average adult vision, so if you are one of the folks both lucky and unlucky enough to have above-average vision (or below, for that matter) you should take that into account.
As but one example, the parent's example transition at 7 to 8 feet would occur around 10 feet for me. Above-average vision is great on paper but translates into more expensive displays positioned farther away. :(
I am not advocating something that covers your entire field of view. But a smaller screen that you can focus on in your field of vision while still being able to see around you.
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