Home Theater & Sound "Video Noise"

Video Noise

December 2009

I Want to Make My Picture Better: Part Two

Last month’s installment explained your first two options for improving picture accuracy: adjusting the user menu controls by eye and adjusting menu controls with the assistance of a setup disc in your Blu-ray or DVD player. This month we’ll explore the third and fourth calibration options, each of which is more advanced and will allow you to more closely match your video display to the standards that define an accurate picture.

Teaching yourself how to calibrate

This option can be tricky. Many think they can spend less than $200 on a colorimeter and use free software to get a decent calibration, but it’s just not going to happen. Inexpensive meters are poor at measuring color, though they’re sometimes OK for measuring shades of gray. They become very slow, however, when the screen gets darker, so measuring the darker grayscale steps can take a long time. If you want to calibrate your image with a trustworthy meter and reliable software, expect to spend about $675 for CalMAN Home Edition with a Chroma 5 colorimeter. Without the right tools, you’ll likely end up seeing errors (in test patterns) even when your cheap meter claims the image is accurate.

People also underestimate how much time and practice it takes to learn calibration. Many in the "I can calibrate for $200" crowd think that a few hours of study and practice will be enough, but to get it right, they end up investing closer to 100 hours. And by then, they discover that they can’t trust the readings from their $200 colorimeter, so they sell it (at a loss) and buy a Chroma 5 or the more expensive i1-Pro.

I’m not saying you can’t teach yourself how to calibrate, but you simply can’t do it without a substantial investment of both time and money. Too many people underestimate the cost and effort required, and they end up either quitting before properly calibrating their display or paying for professional calibration anyway.

You should also be aware that inexpensive colorimeters drift over time, as the filters change and the meters become less accurate. And because some inexpensive meters can’t be recalibrated, the meter you buy today could be worthless in three years. Even if you buy a meter that can be recalibrated, the cost of recalibration can be considerable compared to the cost of the meter itself. Learning to do your own calibrating can be an interesting experience, but don’t expect to save money.

Hiring a professional calibrator

Unfortunately, not all professional calibration is equal, and hiring a professional won’t always guarantee image accuracy. Some retail stores are dabbling in calibration, and they have a fairly dismal track record. You’ll also find a lot of variation in what they call calibration. In some cases, a guy shows up with a $20 setup disc, adjusts your menu settings (and may not even get those right), and leaves after an hour. Other times you’ll get a guy with $5000 worth of hardware and software who still doesn’t know what he’s doing. And even in those cases, the expensive equipment might not be accurate.

You’ll likely get higher-quality calibration from an independent calibrator (a professional who doesn’t work for a store). This won’t guarantee complete accuracy, but you’ll have a much greater chance of achieving the best possible result. As with any profession, some independent calibrators aren’t great, but many are fantastic in what they can do. The best independent professional calibrators will typically have $10,000 to $30,000 invested in their video-calibration hardware and software, and few calibrators who have invested that much in their tools will be clueless about how to use them.

What will professional calibration cost? You’ll pay somewhere between $250 and $500 for most video displays. And if you don’t live in a metro area, you might have to pay extra for a calibrator to visit your home. There are also a lot of calibration options. You may want a special calibration for black-and-white movies, or you might want a custom calibration for your laserdisc player. You can also have different calibrations for standard definition and high definition. If you’re lucky enough to own a high-end video processor like a Lumagen Radiance XE ($6000 MSRP), you can expect to pay more because the extra adjustments and fine control will increase calibration time.

If you want to calibrate two or more video displays in your home, most professionals will offer a discount. They may also offer a discount on follow-up visits for displays they’ve previously calibrated.

Regardless of the calibration method you choose, once you attain an accurate image you’ll see movies exactly as the director and cinematographer intended. You may need a few days to "come down" from the over-hyped images you’re used to seeing from your out-of-the-box settings. In fact, a calibrated TV would have the worst-looking display in a video wall at a typical big-box store. It would be the only accurate display, but it would look dimmer and duller next to all the hyped images. The reality, however, is that the calibrated display is right, and those other displays are distorting the heck out of the images. Give your improved display two or three days to wipe your memory of the old settings and you’ll begin to notice how much more natural everything looks.

. . . Doug Blackburn
db@hometheatersound.com

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