UHD Review A Few Words About A few words about...™ - Heat -- in 4k UHD (1 Viewer)

[JWC1969]

Hm... this disc has gotten enough great reviews for me to conclude I need to do more tinkering with my TV (LG OLED G2 77-inch), because to my eye this UHD disc is so dim it's unpleasant to watch and I'm squinting just to try to make out the actor's facial expressions during night scenes. Admittedly I've been mostly peeking at various scenes rather than watching the whole film yet, so maybe it's also partly a matter of letting your eyes get used to it?

I'm in a nearly pitch-black room, I'm in Cinema mode (with Filmmaker Mode on). OLED pixel brightness at 90 or above, contrast at 85, black level at 50, Energy Saver is off, AI brightness nonsense is off. And yet, the included blu-ray looks like a much better and more film-like image. I can see that the UHD is sharper in the areas that are bright enough to see, but it's overall just a misery to look at. Clearly I'm going to have to consider hiring someone to calibrate my TV, but other UHD discs that I own look fine to me. I know it's all very subjective.

IMHO, it's not your TV and it's not you. I really think Mr. Mann did a disservice to this film by gutting the color saturation and making it so dim. To me, at least, LA screams vibrancy and color. (Which was how the film was originally graded. Well, at least way more vibrant and colorful than this pass.) The film as it is now, in 4K HDR, looks like it was filmed in Nome, Alaska in the dead of winter. For the first time in my life, I've tucked away the 4K version and even the 1080p version that came out a couple years ago based on a 4K scan and have gone back to my original WB blu-ray, which, despite losing resolution (and based on an older scan), to my eyes looks much more palatable and the way I remember it from the version I saw in the theater in December 1995. And yes, I know Mr. Mann has more knowledge of cinema and the art of cinematography and color grading in his little finger than I have in my whole body but, again, I'm not a fan of his choices here.

 

[Lamphorn]

Have you turned off the LG's automatic brightness limiter (ABL)? By default, LG OLED's will automatically dim static and dark scenes after a couple minutes to mitigate burn-in risk, and it can be aggressive, reducing dim scenes to almost pitch black. The only way to turn it off is with a service remote that can be purchased on Amazon for less than $10. Unfortunately, turning off ABL will void your warranty, but I can't watch dark content with the ABL turned on.

EDIT: Calibration also helped immensely with black levels on my G1.

Hi, no I haven't. I've been reading up on this issue too because I noticed it while watching House of the Dragon, haha. I don't think I was having the ABL issue with Heat since I was skipping around the disc and watching little bits here and there, though I'm sure it would happen if I let one of the dark scenes play out for a while.

 

[Lamphorn]

IMHO, it's not your TV and it's not you. I really think Mr. Mann did a disservice to this film by gutting the color saturation and making it so dim. To me, at least, LA screams vibrancy and color. (Which was how the film was originally graded. Well, at least way more vibrant and colorful than this pass.) The film as it is now, in 4K HDR, looks like it was filmed in Nome, Alaska in the dead of winter. For the first time in my life, I've tucked away the 4K version and even the 1080p version that came out a couple years ago based on a 4K scan and have gone back to my original WB blu-ray, which, despite losing resolution (and based on an older scan), to my eyes looks much more palatable and the way I remember it from the version I saw in the theater in December 1995. And yes, I know Mr. Mann has more knowledge of cinema and the art of cinematography and color grading in his little finger than I have in my whole body but, again, I'm not a fan of his choices here.

I'm still up in the air on my opinion about it because I do want to make sure I'm watching it correctly (haha), but it is kind of offputting the way the disc looks "out of the box". I know many on this forum also watch on projectors and I haven't tried it out on mine yet (Epson 3800), so I might do that next.

In case it makes any difference, I'm using the Sony UBP X700 player with the TV, with Dolby Vision turned on. This player also confounds me because it sends a "Dolby Vision" signal (at least the TV thinks it is) even when I play non-DV UHD discs or standard Blu Rays! No idea!

I also have a Panasonic UB820 that I usually use for the projector, but maybe I'll hook it up to the TV and see what happens.

 

[ManW_TheUncool]

In case it makes any difference, I'm using the Sony UBP X700 player with the TV, with Dolby Vision turned on. This player also confounds me because it sends a "Dolby Vision" signal (at least the TV thinks it is) even when I play non-DV UHD discs or standard Blu Rays! No idea!

That is a well-known design/implementation flaw in those older Sony players. No idea why Sony designers/engineers thought that made any sense (and apparently never fixed it via firmware/software update), but basically, you'll have to manually enable/disable DV yourself based on what you're playing back for correct results.

_Man_

 

[Bartman]

It's actually more problematic in dark scenes, because the ABL is not triggered by motion but by static average picture level brightness. So if the content maintains a static, low average brightness for more than a few minutes, it will still trigger the ABL, and the ABL will dim the picture even further. It's a problem when watching content with sustained night sequences (like Heat) and day-for-night sequences with static, low average brightness. Vincent goes into it in detail in his video.

As I said, I'm not seeing changes in brightness (like when the TV was new, that was horrible), its just certain Blu-rays are uniformly dark. I use the ISF Dark setting, I should try ISF Bright, that may help.

 

[Robert Crawford]

Ever since I bought into 4K discs five years ago, I've read complaints about discs being too dark. So far I've never noticed 4K discs or digitals being too dark as an issue for me.

 

[titch]

Ever since I bought into 4K discs five years ago, I've read complaints about discs being too dark. So far I've never noticed 4K discs or digitals being too dark as an issue for me.

It's because you don't use a projector

 

[Kyle_D]

Ever since I bought into 4K discs five years ago, I've read complaints about discs being too dark. So far I've never noticed 4K discs or digitals being too dark as an issue for me.

Most people run their displays way brighter than the 100 nit peak reference in SDR. HDR doesn’t allow people to adjust brightness up in the same way as SDR, in part because the PQ curve relies on absolute nit values. Most pixels on HDR content are still encoded well below 100 nits, so HDR content ends up looking a lot darker than people are used to on their boosted SDR displays.

HDR tone mapping also adjusts the nit values of the curve further downward on displays that can’t hit 1000 nits (i.e, most of them), exacerbating the perception that HDR is darker.

Finally, a lot of meter-obsessed colorists like to dance on the edge of the histogram and produce content that looks fine on $30K mastering displays, but ends up looking crushed on uncalibrated consumer displays with significantly less sophisticated panels and processing. Vincent’s recent video on HotD exemplifies this.

 

[Jeffrey D]

Ever since I bought into 4K discs five years ago, I've read complaints about discs being too dark. So far I've never noticed 4K discs or digitals being too dark as an issue for me.

I don’t do any farting around with my TV adjustments, after setting them up for the first time. I keep everything set right down the middle, and so far the UHD disk that looked a little dark for me is National Lampoon’s Animal House. All the other 4K discs I have played looked fine to my eyes.

 

[Bartman]

As I said, I'm not seeing changes in brightness (like when the TV was new, that was horrible), its just certain Blu-rays are uniformly dark. I use the ISF Dark setting, I should try ISF Bright, that may help.

A darker room and ISF Bright definitely helped with the Lockout Blu-ray!!!!!!

 

[Josh Dial]

Ever since I bought into 4K discs five years ago, I've read complaints about discs being too dark. So far I've never noticed 4K discs or digitals being too dark as an issue for me.

Nor have I. There are certainly transfers that are dark, but for the most part those accord with my (admittedly failing) memory of the theatrical release. The outliers are usually just bad transfers from top to bottom. I don't think I've ever personally seen a disc that "too" dark.

 

[Bartman]

Here's the remote:

See on Amazon

and here's a video outlining the problem and how to change the LG service menu to disable ABL:



It worked wonders for my 65" E6P.

I purchased the LG service remote. Vincent does not give keystroke instructions in his video. I searched online for instructions but could not find any. I don't want to brick my TV. I just want to change the TPC & GSR settings to hopefully improve 4K viewing, can anyone provide instructions?

 

[Kyle_D]

I purchased the LG service remote. Vincent does not give keystroke instructions in his video. I searched online for instructions but could not find any. I don't want to brick my TV. I just want to change the TPC & GSR settings to hopefully improve 4K viewing, can anyone provide instructions?

I just sent you a PM.

The code comes up as the first result when you search "lg service menu access code" in google.

 

[Bartman]

I just sent you a PM.

The code comes up as the first result when you search "lg service menu access code" in google.

OK thanks, I rewatched Domenic's LG Service Remote YT vids for a second time and it cleared up what needed to be done (and what to avoid!).

 

[Bartman]

With TPC & GSR turned off there is a substantial increase in SDR peak brightness (Vincent only mentioned HDR?), it's like having a new TV!
My only concern with my LG B8 is, when pausing a streaming 4K movie, the static logo is very bright, is there an easy way of temporarily dimming or blanking the screen while paused without exiting the streaming app? Thanks in advance.

 

[Carlo_M]

I do not know the difference between my C1 and the B8 model. But whenever I know I'm going away from my TV for more than a couple of minutes (let's say I have to pause something and go to the kitchen to stir something for 5 minutes or so) I use the vocal command button on my LG Smart Remote and say "Turn Screen Off". What this does is power down the screen but not the TV. When you come back, just hit volume up or one of the directional buttons on the center part of the remote and it will come back to life and whatever was paused onscreen should still be there.

That vocal command is a shortcut to clicking the gear icon button -> OLED care -> Device Self Care -> Energy Saving -> Screen Off. It does the same thing but takes five clicks and menu navigation, versus just issuing the voice command through the remote.

 

[Bartman]

I do not know the difference between my C1 and the B8 model. But whenever I know I'm going away from my TV for more than a couple of minutes (let's say I have to pause something and go to the kitchen to stir something for 5 minutes or so) I use the vocal command button on my LG Smart Remote and say "Turn Screen Off". What this does is power down the screen but not the TV. When you come back, just hit volume up or one of the directional buttons on the center part of the remote and it will come back to life and whatever was paused onscreen should still be there.

That vocal command is a shortcut to clicking the gear icon button -> OLED care -> Device Self Care -> Energy Saving -> Screen Off. It does the same thing but takes five clicks and menu navigation, versus just issuing the voice command through the remote.

Thanks, that worked. If anyone has a "Screen On/Off" command using one of the colored buttons on the Magic remote I'd appreciate it if they'd post here?

 

[Dave H]

Ever since I bought into 4K discs five years ago, I've read complaints about discs being too dark. So far I've never noticed 4K discs or digitals being too dark as an issue for me.

I have a front projector which has to do some heavy tone mapping and I too have never encountered a UHD BD being too dark...including this one.

 

[JMB9]

This is now $8.99 on Amazon. For that price, I'll see for myself if I enjoy the HDR treatment.

 

[bujaki]

This is now $8.99 on Amazon. For that price, I'll see for myself if I enjoy the HDR treatment.

Not the price for the 4K!