How to use Avia to calibrate TV? (1 Viewer)

[MalluS]

Guys:

I recently bought a Pansonic S97 DVD Player and had bought the Avia disk in last month to calibrate TV with the new dvd player purchase. I have a Sony XBR 60'' RPTV. Being a newbie to calibration, I started out with setting the picture mode on tv to 'Professional' and settings of DVD Player to default. I went thru the disk where they explain the tests and then show the actuals to personalize your TV.

My Setup

TV: Sony XBR 60'' LCD RPTV
TV Mode: Professional
DVD Player: Panasonic S97
Settings: Default
Connection: HDMI cable from DVD Player, connected via HDMI(female)-DVI(male) Adapter into TV's DVI Port.
Resolution: 720p

Gotta say, Im totally lost! The only thing I set correctly was Hue using the blue filter! Thats it! Other than that, I could not correctly set the brightness or Picture correctly. Color was not an option in the basic setup so could not adjust it.

For Picture settings, the demo talked about two vertical bars that would move thru the screen but I did not see them at all. I saw the small horizontal blocks but was not sure at what point was the box under one would be twice darker than above.

For black (brightness) settings I think, I saw the black on left and gray on right, but did not know what should I be looking at !! Again did not see any two vertical bars moving.

Finally was the sharpness pattern with circle in center and bars on top and bottom of screen, again..had no clue why I could not see the white lines between the black, that supposedly I should have seen when the brightness was totally notched up. Was not sure where I should be setting the sharpness.

Needlessly to say, I had no clue what I was doing Can you tell me what am I missing here...feel totally lost

Your help shall be greatly appreciated

 

[MalluS]

Can anyone help me in calibrating my TV using Avia?

 

[ChrisWiggles]

Sure:

to set brightness with the basic pattern, look in the dark half of the picture and you'll see the two moving bars that are above black. If you don't see them, raise the brightness control until you do see them. If you are suffering severe washout for some reason due to the gray part of the image, you can acess another pattern in the advanced section, i believe under gray/black white levels or something, it's a 'full black + moving bars' pattern, it's the same pattern with the moving black bars but without the gray.

To set white level with your LCD, you should use the two moving white bars in the needle pulse pattern. If you raise the contrast all the way, you may see these bars dissappear, as they are being clipped by the display. Make sure you are below the point of clipping if your display clips. Also look for color shift at high contrast levels in the bright white square of the pattern. You want to keep your contrast below the point at which is runs out of a specific color and white begins to tint a little bit.

Adjust the sharpness contol as directed in the explanations, such that edge enhancement halos are minimzed. you may find that the sharpness control in your display is not hideous, so you might not see the halos as drastic as that in the example video they give in the explanation, but look closely for them at the screen as you adjust this option.

hope that helps!

 

[MalluS]

Figured it out now, at last!

- When the HDMI RGB Range for the DVD Player is set to Enhanced, Black Crush occurs. Setting to standard resolves the issues. Both lines appeared once the setting was standard.

Two open questions still unresolved:

- Picture/Contrast : However much I increase the Picture(contrast) on my TV, the two bars always show. They never dissappear as the tutorial mentioned they might. What should the Picture be then?

- Sharpness: Again, even if I turn up the sharpness to max, I still cannot see the white shadows next to the black bars in the center. How do I set the sharpness then.

I really appreciate your replying to my thread. Any recommendations for above two patterns?

 

[ChrisWiggles]

Mallus:

I did not previously realize you were connected via a digital connection method, in which case sharpness adjustment probably won't affect that input, as you're seeing. I would leave it at a low or neutral setting, and it seems it has no effect anyway, so that's ok.

Yes, and you do want to make sure your levels are NOT in "enhanced" mode as that performs a Video to PC level expansion that clips BTB and peak whites. This is undesireable. Leave it normal.

If your LCD display does not clip the bars at its max setting, you need to look for color shift at very high setting, and set it below this.

Quote from Guy Kuo (Avia):

"On lamp based displays, having contrast doesn't shorten display life but causes clipping of hilites or shifts in the color of white as one primary color or another runs out of dynamic range. Clipping of hilites means that things that are bright but not quite white become indisinguishable from white. Shifts in the color of white means the color of white changes. On DLP's that shift is often blue-green."

In your case, you've discovered that your set does not clip at it's highest setting, so look for subtle shifts in color at high settings (may take a careful eye), and set your contrast below this point.

Note that the explanations on Avia are heavy towards CRT based displays, and looking for geometry distortions, loss of beam focus/blooming, etc will not occur on your digital device. Your use of the pattern is slightly different as a result of the different behavior of your display.

 

[MalluS]

Chris:

"If your LCD display does not clip the bars at its max setting, you need to look for color shift at very high setting, and set it below this."

Since the patterns are black & white, what 'color's shift should I be looking at? Apologize if this is a silly Q.

 

[ChrisWiggles]

It's a very small, subtle change, but basically you may find that if you use very high contrast levels, the display will "run out" of one or more colors, and the color of white will be lacking slightly this color. You may see the color of white change ever so slightly at these max points. A way to see this is to view pattern like a steps pattern, and adjust contrast up and down near the high range of the adjustment, and view the brightest white part of the pattern. You may see it shift in the color of white *ever* so slightly (it may be more obvious, you may not run of our any color at all). By viewing the parts of the pattern that are less bright, you can compare the color of white a little better, and see the brightest part shift slightly while the others will not. Play around with this a little bit, and you may see this effect. But as you note, you're not clipping white details at a max setting, so the most damaging (IMO) limitation is not really apparent in your display, so you may be able to max the contrast setting if you're noot seeing color shifting at high settings.

 

[Jeff Gatie]

I didn't know black and white were not colors. I now have to edit my Pantone paint strips .

Seriously, what you are looking for is a subtle shift from not-quite white to blazing white. I use the stacked black to grey to white box pattern for this. You should be able to distinguish the separate, individual boxes with no washout of either the blacks or the whites.