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The Hayden Planetarium is betting $2 million on black.
The stars and galaxies projected onto the museum’s massive dome may seem spectacular, but to the engineers behind the space shows, they’ve seemed as gray and washed out as the skies over Midtown.
But that’s about to change.
The Post was given a sneak peek of a system being installed this month that not only has significantly higher resolution but, unlike nearly all digital projectors in existence, can display true black.
Incorporating military technology designed to allow pilots to wear night-vision goggles in flight simulators, the stunning new projectors can display the darkest blackness of space, as well as its brightest lights, said Benjy Bernhardt, audiovisual director of the Rose Center at the Museum of Natural History, which includes the planetarium.
“This trumps every other planetarium in the world,” Bernhardt said. “The contrast adds a tremendous richness and realism that you can’t get from a standard digital projector.”
The contrast between the darkest darks and lightest lights is now 500,000 to 1. To put that in perspective, the contrast on a typical digital cinema showing “X-Men: First Class” is 2,000 to 1.
To demonstrate the $2 million effect, Jeff Galitzer, the chief video engineer, used the old projectors on one half of the planetarium’s dome and the new ones on the other.
“On this side, you see a rich-looking image of the Milky Way. It’s totally glorious,” said Galitzer, pointing to the half of the dome using the new setup. “This side, on the other hand, we’re in space sort of, I think.”
Much of the lush detail in the space show were invisible to viewers on the old system.
“See all these stars?” Galitzer asked, pointing to the better half of the dome. “Well, the same number of stars are over here, you just can’t see them. These were great projectors, but the new ones are far greater.”
When the Rose Center opened in 2000, the planetarium set the standard for the rest of the world, but despite incremental improvements, it was clear by 2005 that its operators needed to look to newer technology.
“In our mind’s eye, we knew what our content was capable of, but we had to wait for the technology — and the rest of the world — to catch up,” Galitzer said. “What we’re really looking forward to is our next production, when we create a show with this new palette in mind.”