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We had a chance to talk to Netflix at the SMPTE conference about a range of topics. We found them quite open to discussing details. For example, the company is now requesting that all new content be delivered in a 4K-UHD format as they see this as a way to future proof their content. This … Read more
Our meetings in the SMPTE Exhibition area focused on display technology. At 3M, we saw numerous demonstrations of quantum dot displays integrated into products. 3M manufactures the QDEF film that contains quantum dots from Nanosys. For example, 3M showed three Asus laptops side-by-side. One used a conventional white LED in the backlight and achieved 50% … Read more
Andy Rosen from Bitlogic and Dan Brunner from Microsoft gave a compelling demonstration in the Display session at the SMPTE conference where they showed some interesting artifacts that they say are attributable to the overdriving techniques used in nearly all LCD displays to improve the speed of response. The effect has been long suspected, but … Read more
The terms “scene referred” and “display referred” have come up a lot lately in discussions about HDR workflows and the transforms needed to capture and display this wider dynamic range content. A paper by Tim Borer and Andrew Cotton from the BBC Research & Development team at the SMPTE fall conference shed more light on … Read more
A paper by Tim Borer and Andrew Cotton from the BBC Research & Development team at the SMPTE fall conference shed more light on what Hybrid Log Gamma (HLG) is and why it may be better suited to realtime or live broadcast than alternative transforms like the Perceptual Quantizer (PQ) curve. (BBC Approach to HDR … Read more
Josef Marc of Archimedia Technology gave a presentation that resonates well with me – and perhaps with the audience. He espoused that the way we talk about image quality and control its attributes are not very intuitive for the consumer and is inconsistent. Plus, he asked if consumers want more control over the image or … Read more
At last year’s SMPTE conference, James Hillis from 3M described some tests they had done to try to determine how far the 2020 color primaries can move and still be indistinguishable from a true 2020 display. This year, he provides some updates to the work they have continued. The goal is to try to define … Read more
Much of the color standards and color calibration methods and instruments are based upon the “standard observer.” This is supposed to represent the average human’s color perception, as defined in 1931. But there is much evidence to support the notion that this standard observer model was derived from a sample of 17 white anglo males … Read more
It is possible for a variety of spectrally unique (and different) stimuli to produce identical visual responses. Spectrally variant color stimuli that are perceived identically are known as metamers. With display-rendered imagery, the objective is to take advantage of the limitations of the human visual system using a limited subset of emissive primaries (RGB) to … Read more
The concept of better pixels means expanding the frame rates, color gamut, resolution and dynamic range of HD video to something “more.” But the human visual system is very complex and as these features are implemented, one must consider what this is doing to our perception of the images. Sean McCarthy from Arris presented a … Read more
ST 2094 is quite flexible allowing the use of windows to do specific transforms. That means a window may be used to apply a different transform for a bright highlight or dark region of the scene. Metadata sets can also be created for several types of display targets. This allows grades to be optimized for … Read more
One of the big areas of focus at the SMPTE conference was the need to ensure that the wide range of luminance and color carried in HDR signals will map correctly in SDR displays with lower luminance ranges and smaller color volumes. This is called color volume transformation and includes color and luminance mapping. The … Read more
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