TV colour balance

[FennerMachine]

Most DVD's and Blu-rays look really good after spending some extra time fiddling with the settings using DVE HD Basics. I have noticed that reds flare a bit such as Superman’s red cape.

I have a few questions:

Black does not appear absolute, is this just something with LCD TV's due to using a back light?

Adjusting colours with Colour and Tint controls with a blue,red, green filter, I can get blue to look very accurate, green good but reds just don’t match up. Is this a limitation of the screen? A bias toward red? I have Emailed Samsung to ask them this specific question but any suggestions would be welcome.

Would it be worth trying to compensate with settings in the Blu-ray player?

I have colour space set to Wide instead of Auto as this seems to help with a more accurate green when setting colours. Could this introduce other issues?

I have also bumped gamma up to +2. Is this a good idea? I've read in a few places that LCD TV's need to be set at about +2.2.

As I'm not going to spend any money on a professional calibration or equipment should I just accept that it will not be perfect and enjoy what I have?

 

[D.J.KRIME]

Most DVD's and Blu-rays look really good after spending some extra time fiddling with the settings using DVE HD Basics. I have noticed that reds flare a bit such as Superman’s red cape.

I have a few questions:

Black does not appear absolute, is this just something with LCD TV's due to using a back light?

Adjusting colours with Colour and Tint controls with a blue,red, green filter, I can get blue to look very accurate, green good but reds just don’t match up. Is this a limitation of the screen? A bias toward red? I have Emailed Samsung to ask them this specific question but any suggestions would be welcome.

Would it be worth trying to compensate with settings in the Blu-ray player?

I have colour space set to Wide instead of Auto as this seems to help with a more accurate green when setting colours. Could this introduce other issues?

I have also bumped gamma up to +2. Is this a good idea? I've read in a few places that LCD TV's need to be set at about +2.2.

As I'm not going to spend any money on a professional calibration or equipment should I just accept that it will not be perfect and enjoy what I have?

Quite a few questions but I will do my best to try and help

The DVDHD disc is a good tool (i use it when calibrating a TV) but without the use of a PC and meter it can only go so far into setting up your TV.

Firstly IMHO blacks on a LCD are allways a weak point but they have improved recently, but these are at their best on any TV when the contrast and brightness are correctly set, but can be affected if your TVs greyscale and gamma are off. I would have a guess that your TVs greyscale is not tracking correctly along with issues with the TVs colour balance but these can't be adjusted by eye alone so unless your prepaired to invest into a meter(about £100) then IMHO you will have to live with these errors your seeing on your TV.

It is quite easy to achieve a far better result with very little extra outlay as you allready have the DVE disc and nodoubt a PC(software needed is free!) Have a read HERE and you can read through my home calibration results.:dance:

 

[FennerMachine]

Thanks for the replay D.J.KRIME, I've seen that thread you linked to but not had a good read of it, I'll do so later. I don't fancy spending out on meters so will live with the errors.

After doing some research and reading reviews of my TV and general advice from various sources on calibrating TV's I've actually found the answers to my questions.

After applying a mixture of the various advise and another quick go with the DVE Blu-ray I'm now fairly happy with the result I have & feel I can live with what I have without spending out on analysing equipment or a pro calibration.

Something I realised a day or so ago when setting up the colours is that I wear reactor light glasses that have a slight permanent yellow/brown tint to them which affects the colours noticeably! During the day the affect is more as they get darker.This is another reason why settings for one person and room may not be suitable for another!

 

[hyettdman]

In the colour space menu select 'custom'. Turn all of the colours that have numbers such as 50 etc already set, up to about 75, not any others that are set at 0. Then go back to the main menu colour and reduce the colours gradually, that way getting an even balance without washing the picture out. this method can work. or failing that reduce the colour space to about 25 and add colour gradually.i also put the black tone to its darkest setting and dynamic contrast to low.let me know how you get on if you give it a try.

 

[FennerMachine]

Interesting suggestion hyettdman but I can only adjust colour by total saturation and green/red tint.

Unless I misunderstand? Not the first time I've misunderstood someone (or been misunderstood!).

There are other options for white balance Offset & Gain but they don't appear to alter the picture as I would have expected. I tried altering the Red on both, one at a time, both up, both down, 1 up & 1 down, but the Red in the colour bar test pattern stays the same viewed through the Red filter. Another option can change pink, green, blue & white but they don't seem to make a difference either.

I've settled on:

Picture: Movie

Contrast: 90

Brightness: 50 something (I will edit later, doing all from memory!)

Sharpness: 0

Colour: 47

Tint: 60/40

Colour Tone: Warm2

Back light: 0

Colour space: Auto

HDMI black: Low

All 'enhancements' off (PC mode, black adjust, dynamic contrast, DNIe etc.)

These settings seem to give a nice balance for the colours, non being perfect.

Blacks look black but with detail where it should be and brighter parts don't bleed into each other.

The only setting I might change is Colour Tone as Warm2 with Movie is supposed to be closest to D65 standard but Warm1 gives a more 3D like image and better separation of people/moving objects. This might be due to my glasses tinting what I see so Warm1 would be closer to D65 for me.

 

[hyettdman]

I see in your settings, you have a 'colour space' option and you have selected 'auto' .Have you the option to set it to 'custom' like i suggested instead of 'auto'. if so follow the imformation i gave you regarding setting the colours, its the best way to really get your tv looking as good as possible.You can then judge the picture yourself,you know when it looks right.

 

[FennerMachine]

Only Auto or Wide options.

Wide does change the overall image but from what I've read Auto is more accurate.

 

[hyettdman]

if thats the only two options in the colour space you have 'auto ' is the best. i would'nt mess about to much with the r-gain and g-gain or white balance you can make the picture worse sometimes.I see you have it set in 'movie' mode. If you select 'standard 'or' normal 'have you more options in the colour space then or does it remain the same

 

[FennerMachine]

The other options are 'Normal' and 'Dynamic'.

They have the same or less options than 'Movie'.

I think the service menu has more options but as brave as I am I'm not venturing there!

From one of the reviews I've read it does say my TV has a slight red 'push' that they could not completely fix even with calibration equipment. Even so they managed a good picture that was close to D65.

I think I'll leave it as it is now. I could spend hours tweaking it but even with a light meter it would never be perfect. I think I'll just change to Warm1 and enjoy!

Thanks for the advise though and please feel free to give any other suggestions in case I've missed something! Might be useful for others too.

 

[f1only]

Reset your TV's settings first ( after you have made a note of what settings you have now ), the settings below turn off most of the processing & the Movie mode in the 1st setting will get the TV closest to the D65 standard.

Mode - Movie

Brightness - 50

Sharpness - 10

Colour - 50

Tint - 50 / 50

Backlight - 7

Screen Size - Auto wide or Just Scan

Edge Enhancement - OFF

Digital NR - OFF

Active Colour -OFF

DNie - OFF

Movie Plus - OFF

Black Adjust - OFF

Dynamic Contrast - OFF

Gamma - 0

Edge Enhancement - OFF

HDMI Black Level - OFF

Energy Saving - OFF ( the TV actually uses less power with this feature turned off if properly calibrated )

Having done the above use the HD Basics disc, or alternatively download the AVCHD 709 disc which is free, found here clicky, you have to download AVCHD.EXE file & write it to a normal DVD there are instructions on the website & on the DVD once written there is a video telling you how to calibrate your TV.

Regards ...

 

[FennerMachine]

I think I tried that. After using the DVE HD Essentials I ended up with my current settings. Might try them again though on HDMI3.