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***Official Digital Video Essentials Discussion Thread*** (1 Viewer)

Clemens

Grip
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Jul 30, 2003
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I posted in another heading, but was refered over here. My problem with DVE is two-fold at this point.

1) I am not able to see ANY difference with my sharpness control. The pattern provided remains the same at 0% as 100%. Thoughts? Suggestions?

2) I have the same problem with the 5.1 pink noise audio calibration. In order to have all speakers at 75db, I have to turn the internal speaker settings all the way up to 10 and then really crank the volume far above anything I would watch a movie at. Am I doing something wrong or misunderstanding what I am doing?

As someone mentioned earlier, I am not an idiot (well, depending on your point of view), but parts of DVE seem pretty technical unless you really know what you are doing.
Same here, I didn't get any of those 'extra lines' with the sharpness control, therefore I wasn't sure where to set it.
The only difference I got that it got a tinee tiny bit blurry, so I just put it at 50%.

Also, someone mentioned about which band tone to use(full/limited) above for spl adjustments, and I am wondering about the same thing too.
Does anyone have an answer?
 

Eric_AP

Stunt Coordinator
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Also, someone mentioned about which band tone to use(full/limited) above for spl adjustments, and I am wondering about the same thing too.
Does anyone have an answer?
Based on the response to my similar question in another forum -- I would use the limited bandwidth audio signals.

Here is the post in the other forum:

Other forum post
 

Thomas Smailus

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Yes, the THX tones are not for setting the level. If you have a home theater reciever, it will, however, supply you with test tones directly, which you can use to set levels. Those, in combination with the THX Optimizer and $2 blue filters from the THX store, should provide you with enough to set up your home theater at a state thats more than good enough for government work. This, especially in light of the questions about the variations in these other discs - levels high, low, LFE higher lower, etc. I'm not interested in knowing that my 0dB setting is at 'reference level' - what I need is the 7.1 speakers to be balanced and properly adjusted so that the sound field is right, at whatever overal volume level I decide to run at.

For those doing advanced tuning of their sets to correct for overscan, pincushion, red levels, centering patterns, and the like - there might be use for these disks, but the more I read about the variability between them, the more I'm inclined to think that with just the user controls and settings I'm using on my SD set, $2 is all I have to spend (thats the shipping included - you have to own some THX dvd film, of course, that has the optimizer software).


---

Now having gone throught the THX optimizer myself, without the blue filters, I can say that in the settings there, I could drive the contrast to 100 and not loose the block definitions of the various white blocks. I then had to turn the brightness way way down and still had the last (7th?) dark block visible (as my dvd player doesn't pass the 0IRE blacker-than-black signal, I think its called).

In the sharpness settings, I, as others with the DVE tests, could not set it anywhere to generate an effect like is described in the THX-Opt instructions... if one can figure out what their language means without an over-exagerated and blown up example image of what to look for. Without the glasses - looking for 'red bleed' was impossible as I saw no marked change that might indicate a 'bleed' - whatever that is. Tint - near the center got me the cyan and magenta I'm used to from my CYMK printing on top end printers at work.


I'm curious if these DvD's will provide any substantial benefit if using just user controls (not service menu) on my SD set (which is only a 22" Sony Trinitron box from a while back).
 

Dustin Wind

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AS for the sharpness questions:

If you watch the disk , it says "if you don't notice a diffrence with sharpness going up or down, then turn it all the way down"
 

Clemens

Grip
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Messages
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AS for the sharpness questions:

If you watch the disk , it says "if you don't notice a diffrence with sharpness going up or down, then turn it all the way down"
It also says if you do see bluriness, bring it up. -> doesn't help much, and I get some kind of noticeable bluriness. I just go "why bother" and put it at 50%.
 

KyleJ

Auditioning
Joined
Sep 19, 2003
Messages
3
I just got the disk the other day.

I have to say the navigation is hard but manageable.

To answer the question about centering, on my 27 inch sony wega the right side and top show about 1/2% more area than the left or bottom. So my center would be slightly left and down. I guess it is the tv and not the disk.

What percent overscan do yall recommend? Currently it is around 5 percent for my tv. But i want to reduce it because it clips some of the tickers slightly.

Also is there a place that talks about the advanced video patterns and what adjustments to make for them?

Also I got my blue and red filters to work, but looking through the green i couldn't get it right. I tried adjusting the green level in the service menu but it didn't help. Does anyone have a suggestion on how to fix this?

Thanks
 

Dustin Wind

Stunt Coordinator
Joined
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Messages
158
Are you suppose to do the audio tests at "pink level" or the "full bandwidth"?

I set my all my speakers to 75 DB and i'm just noticing now that there is a "pink test" then a louder "full bandwidth".

Which one are you suppose use to get the 75 DB per speaker?
 

Brian L

Senior HTF Member
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Messages
3,302
Since bass levels can vary dramatically from room to room, you will perhaps get better results using band limited pink noise, which is rolled off in the bass region.

However, if you do have legitimately flat response in your room down into the bass region, than full bandwidth tones may also work.

BGL
 

Chris Will

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Chris WIlliams
Okay. I went back and re-calibrated using the old VE and then re-calibrated with DVE. This time I used the Dolby Digital tones and not the DTS. I also turned THX mode OFF, something I forgot to do when I used DVE the first time. Everything turned out better this time. The LEFT and SUR. LEFT had a 1dB increase. The RIGHT and SUR. BACK had a 2dB increase. The CENTER and SUR. RIGHT stayed the same. Those changes are acceptable in my eyes, many things can contribute to those slight changes and it my not be the disc. Then we come to the SUB. There was still a big difference between VE and DVE. DVE was reading 80-82dB when VE was read 75-77dB. So with DVE a few channels needed raised 1-2dB but the SUB needs to be lowered 5dB to hit 75dB. Something fishy with the SUB tones. I left the SUB setting the same, unchanged from my VE settings. It sounded to weak when lowered 5dB. I'm going to try to e-mail Swelltone and see if they have a comment.
 

Todd K

Second Unit
Joined
Oct 21, 2001
Messages
477
This disc is giving me more of a headache than I thought it would. This was my foray into calibration discs and now I think I was expecting a little too much out of the whole experience. Is anyone else in a similar situation?

I bought DVE more for the picture adjustments than the sound. At least with the sound, you are shooting for a setting that can be measured on a device to make sure you getting the EXACT intended setting (though from this thread's discussions, even that may be questionable). With the basic picture calibrations, everything seems to be very subjective, particularly the contrast. I still am not sure what exactly they're telling me to do. And since contrast is very closely related to brightness (perhaps the easiest of these basic controls to calibrate), I'm not sure I have the proper setting on either. In the end, I decided to set the brightness a notch or two above their recomendation, because I was losing too much shadow detail. (However, I now find that the brightness setting I have chosen is the exact one recommended by the THX optimizer on several of my discs -- the point where the drop shawdow in "THX" disappears.)
Then there's the sharpness setting. After all was said and done, I was most confident in my sharpness setting of all the settings. Then I discovered the setting I chose was the exact sharpness setting that was the default on every single one of my TV's picture modes. Reassuring, I guess, but typical of my experiences with this disc.
 

Chris Will

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Chris WIlliams
I sent an e-mail to Joe Kane production about the audio problems some of us are having. They responded pretty quick and I thought that some of you may be interested in what they said. The email from Joe Kane is below with my original message following that:



20 September

Chris,

Thank you for your note. I'm going to have to look into this. The original tones for both discs came from a similar source and were checked by Dolby Labs before they were Dolby encoded on to the disc. A wrong setting in the encoding would account for 10 dB, not 5 dB. There is a 10 dB difference between Lt Rt and multi-channel audio.

Joe Kane

My original message:

Joe Kane Productions,

When I was calibrating my audio using the limited band pink noise on the new DVE disc I noticed some differences that have confused me. I went back and used the old VE disc and then recalibrated again with the new DVE, the changes where still there. A few channels were raised 1-2dBs to hit 75dB. That was not that big of a changed so it did not bother me that much. The SUB was a different matter. When the old VE disc would read 75dB the new DVE would read 80dB. That is a 5dB difference between the two disc. Is there a reason that DVE wants you to set the SUB 5dB lower then the old disc? I was honestly expecting no changes because my mind tells me that 75dB in 1999 should equal 75dB in 2003. I'm just wondering why there is such a big difference in the SUB channel between the two disc. I would appreciate any help.

Thank You,
Chris
So I guess we will see what happens.
 

Brian L

Senior HTF Member
Joined
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3,302
Good work, Chris.

FWIW, I can except that there will be some variance in the magnitude of the differences in the bass that are being reported.

I think I read that the sub tone is from 40 to 80 Hz on DVE. Owing to the fact that the RS meter is not flat, plus the fact that in those frequencies, the room plays a huge roll would easily explain why some users are seeing a 10 dB difference, some an 8, etc.

I will say this though. There is a difference in the bass tone between VE and DVE, no question about it.

I am very keen to hear what Joe Kane reports.

BGL
 

Edwin_H

Stunt Coordinator
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Jan 4, 2003
Messages
230
Something is definitely wrong with the bass test tone. I've been calibrating my sound with Avia before and when I used DVE, all the speakers were within 1-2db, but the darn sub was reading nearly 10db hot! I lowered it to read 75db on the SPL meter and tested out a flick. My SVS PB2+ sounded like a whiny little b*&^$ instead of a monster mother trucker. I went back and re-calibrated with Avia and got the sub back where it should be and once more it shakes the ground beneath me. Something is really wrong with the DVE bass test signal then. After all the delays, it still gets out with a pretty major foul up like this? That's pretty sad.

-E
 
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Patrick E Hannon
I picked up a copy of DVE last week and I seem to be finding the same behaviour with the audio test tones. All of my speakers are set to large (except centre surround - in 6.1)and there is an LFE only sub. All measurements were made with the RS meter mounted to a stand at the listening position, so the results are repeatable. I recalibrated (all DD, no DTS)) the system with VE first (75 dB "C") and the results were at my "reference" of 72dB (I find 75 dB just a bit too loud on some soundtracks) all around with the sub fluctuating between about 72 - 75 dB or so. When DVE was used for the 5.1 (and 6.1) "filtered" noise all of the "speaker locations" registered at a constant 71 dB (except in 5.1 the phantom rear centre was at about 71.5 dB). The sub on the other hand was reading somewhere in the 80 - 81 dB region, about 5 - 6 dB high. A quick check with the full range noise signal ("A" weighting") gave slightly different results, the front speakers were at about 74 dB with the surrounds reading closer to 76 dB and the sub was still high.

A quick check of the video patterns showed the "pluge" results to be the same as VE. Some of the "overscan" patterns seem to be shifted high but the "convergence and gemoetry" signals seemed to be correctly centered, but I did not get a chance to check on this carefully.

The subwoofer (LFE) signal appears to be different from the one on VE (higher by 5 - 6 dB?). I have left my level at the VE calibration as I feel that the DVE level will be too low. The other levels at 1 dB lower is most likely insignificant in the long run.

P.E.Hannon
 

Thomas Smailus

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To those who used the THX OPTIMIZER -
I put this hear as its possible to connect its behaviour with the DVE disc as well.

I finally sat down with my Monsters Inc DvD to run the optimizer with my just obtained THX blue filter paper glasses and my Sony Trinitron 22" sd tv several years of age.

So I sit down and bring up that screen with the words COLOR and TINT accross it in various colored letters used to set the color and the tint while wearing the glasses. I adjust the color until all the letters in the word COLOR are the same brightness/intensity and I adjust the tint until the letters in the word TINT are the same brightness and intensity. As I had some adjusting to do, I figured, ok, this should look much better.

I go to the next screen, which is the color bars and verticle lines for sharpness and one thing strikes me immediately - the TINT is all wrong!

The 'cyan' block is decidedly greenish in color and the magenta more pink. So I push the tint from its 35% setting closer to 50% setting until I get a cyan that looks like a cyan and the magenta looks magenta (based on my having seen a zillion test prints from our Tektronix CYMK color laser and wax printers at work and color photograpy work) and go back to the COLOR TINT test, put the glasses on again, and UGH - the letters in TINT do NOT look the same intensity.

:frowning:
Whats up with that? Anyone know why the two test screens drive to totally different settings on TINT?

(Also, the brightness/contrast settings have me in a mode that is to dark - given I'm watching TV channels as well on the set, but thats another problem).
 

Massimo N

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Oct 23, 2000
Messages
174
I did quickly go through the DVD this weekend and I did notice a few things. As a point in reference I have used AVIA over the last few years

The Bass test tone is definitely recorded hot. I have to experiment a little more. I also have to verify what setting I had it on (DTS vs. DD). I should also note I'm running dual SVS subs, calibrated flat to 20hz ... well I at least have a flat RS response +/-1 db from 20hz to 80hz. I did implement a house curve, but it follows the RS adjustments fairly closely.


The disk menus are confusing. I know this is probably a learning curve. I only spent about 2 hours with the disk, so I'm probably going to need more time.

I would have appreciated some explainations what the test patterns mean. With all the test patterns on AVIA, even though I don't use a lot of them, all test patterns had a note you could view telling you what you were looking at, and how the test pattern we supposed to be used.

Thomas,

I've played with the THX optimizers with all the disks, and they are normally pretty close to my calibrated settings using AVIA ... especially the picture settings.

Setting the colour and tint correctly using the BLUE filter works well only if you have a faily accurate colour decoder. If you have red push (different from a warm colour temperature), your reds will look over saturated. There should be a sticky in the TV section discussing the differences.

Contrast and Brightnest (a.k.a. black level) when initially set correctly, it may appear that the picture is too dark. I would keep it at that level for about a week for your eyes to adjust. It does take some time to adjust ecpecially if you are used to factory defaults.
 

Brian L

Senior HTF Member
Joined
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Messages
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Another observation about the new DVE sharpness pattern.

I am doing a mini shootout between a 45A and a 1600, and calibrated the TV inputs for both with DVE.

What I find is that anything below about midpoint on my sets sharpness control results in noticeable blurring of the test pattern. Above that starts to produce some ghosting or smearing (for lack of better words) around dark/light transitions.

The point is that the resulting settings with Avia and VE have always been minimum or perhaps a click or two above. With DVE, they appear to require much higher settings.

And at those settings, I am seeing what appears to graininess in certain scenes that I don't know should be there.

More testing is required, but thus far I am not sure I like what I am seeing WRT the sharpness pattern and resulting settings.

BGL
 

Edward J M

Senior HTF Member
Joined
Sep 22, 2002
Messages
2,031
I ran through DVE this weekend. My brief thoughts:

1) Brightness/Pluge:

No problems. Adjusted level until outside black bars faded into background. About 33% on my TV.

2) Color:

No problems. The correct setting for blue yielded a slight red push. Dropped it 2% to correct for the red push and it's a good compromise. About 36% on my TV.

3) Tint:

No problems. The center setting on my TV was correct.

4) Sharpness:

Here I had to shut off the "Perfect Piture" setting on my Hitachi in order to get the Sharpness control to work. Once I had the control working, about 65% was correct for my TV.

5) Contrast:

Once again I had to disable Perfect Picture to adjust contrast. I used the DVE Reference Materials test pattern with the horizontal steps that fade from white to grey to black. I adjusted Contrast until the darker steps at the outside of the pattern were the most clear. Deviating Contrast in either direction blacked out these steps. About 53% was correct for my TV.

6) Audio Tests:

At Master Volume 00, I calibrated to 75 dB in all six channels with no trouble. I used the limited bandwidth test tones and C-Weighted Slow on the meter.

The DVE sub level was WAY too hot. I suspect it is an encoding error that uses the LFE channel instead of the low passed bass from a surround channel (like Avia does).

Encoding the LFE channel at the same level as the surround channels will yield a +10 dB test tone as compared to low passed bass from a surround channel.

For example, if your sub is already running 3-4 dB hot, you will see a 13-14 dB increase over the limited bandwidth surround channel level i.e., 75 dB + 13-14 dB = 88-89 dB. In other words, it will bury the meter on the sub tone.

I am almost 100% certain this is an encoding error involving the LFE channel. I used other methods to calibrate my SVS PB2+.

Regards,

Ed
 

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