New Premium Finish arived today. Word to the wise...

[X52]

Hello all.
From what I can tell my last post on this forum was four years ago. Wow, time flies! I have enjoyed my set up so much I really haven't been looking much into upgrading. Every now and again I pop my head in here to see what was going on.
Well about 2 weeks ago I had a little peek and saw the Sierra-1s in three new finishes. I said, "Hey honey, take a look at these..." She said, "Wow those are nice."
I had been on the fence about selling my motorcycle to pay off on a house that we have not been living in but been for sale for almost a year. (Stinks paying two mortgages!) I thought, well maybe I could soften the blow by buying myself a little something AND paying on the house. Two birds one motorcycle sale.
Well, the bike sold three days after I put it up for sale and I bought LFR Sierra's in Espresso and an Emotiva XPA-3 to power them.
Wow, first off I got the amp last Friday and hooked it up to my existing system and WOW is that thing is A-mazing! I will do a review on it later, but if anyone is thinking if they want to get into separate amps...DO IT. It shook the dust of my system and really made it sing.
Well, back to this thread. I loved the look of the espresso color online but a word to the wise, they are darker in person. The pictures online are either of the speaker in direct/near direct sun or photographed with the use of artificial flash photography. This makes it easier to see the grain of the bamboo, which I like, but inside even with a bright theater room I have a very hard time seeing that grain. They still are a VERY attractive color and its very evident that the quality of finish is excellent.
Another interest of mine is woodworking and I love grain, texture and depth of wood finishes. I most likely will keep them, but I wanted others to know they are (at least the ones I received) darker than what appears online. From six feet away they look like a dark brown lacquer with a high gloss polyurethane.
Thanks for your time.

[DougMac]

JH,

Thanks for the heads up. As a former professional photographer and a current web designer, I'm aware of the problems of accurately representing finishes in print and on the web.

I use calibrated monitors and when I check images on the web on different computers that aren't calibrated, I'm astonished at the variation.

I've looked at the new photos Dave posted. The photographer lit and photographed the speakers to make each plane a different brightness to make them three dimensional, which is also the way they would look in a room. The high gloss finish makes them very difficult to light to give them form and to accurately display their color.

It might be helpful and more accurate if Dave could also post a "swatch" of the finishes along with the photos of the speakers. The "swatches" could be photographed (or even scanned) in such a way that there's no reflection of the finish to change the color of the stain.

Anywho, I'm glad you're pleased even if you didn't get quite what you were expecting. I'd really like to know what you had before and your impressions of the Sierra's. I'm also interested in your promise review of the Emotiva amp.

Doug

[davef]

Hi X52,

Unless you are using a color calibrated monitor, it is nearly impossible to accurately depict color/hues/lightness on computer monitors. You would be surprised at just how much it can vary.

I have a color calibrated monitor and the pictures on our website of the espresso match up well to the actual finish. That being said, in the photos - very bright lighting is used and must be in order to capture the detail of the speakers. In addition, the finish will look different under different types of lighting.

Personally, I feel we did a good job at accurately displaying the finish in those pictures but I do agree with you, in a dark room and at a distance away, the grain will definitely be less noticeable and the speakers will appear to be darker.

Glad that you are enjoying the speakers!!!

[DougMac]

Hi X52,
Personally, I feel we did a good job at accurately displaying the finish in those pictures but I do agree with you, in a dark room and at a distance away, the grain will definitely be less noticeable and the speakers will appear to be darker.

Maybe that's why in my light controlled HT with dark paint, black ceilings and subdued lighting my 340's look black!