the beam through a slightly defocused aspherical lens will probably get you closer to what you want than anything else.
Here is the beam from my Lenslight, adjusted to the most defocused setting. It is about 30" at 7'.
There are substantial artifacts outside the main beam, this is very hard to avoid with out $$$$$ optics.
im thinking a beam that looks similar to an aspheric, but not 100% like an aspheric.
a beam i can throw 80- 100 feet approx, to create a brightly lit area about 6-8 feet in diameter, with very little spill.
all my reflector lights seem to make a lot of spill, my only optic light (Decree) is close, but still has some spill.
just wondering if surefire use better/different optics then the others?
id take that if it were at 80 feet 7 feet across and 350 lumens.
This is pretty tight collimation. An aspheric will do it, but probably with a somehwat square "projected die" beam instead of a nice, clean circle. I think the DEFT beam, which is about as collimated as you're likely to see, is about 40" @ 100'. So you're asking for something that is only slightly less collimated than that. Simplest platform to start experimenting is probably Mag with KD aspheric lens.