Grade-worthy Displays?

[Brandon Fraley]

For super budget conscious folks, or as a desktop companion to something like a Cine-tal or EIZO, the DELL 2408FWP seems like a nice monitor, especially at just over $600. I've got one coming in a few days so I'll report back when I've had a chance to bang on it a little harder.

Please do and thanks for the rest of the info

 

[Cüneyt Kaya]

the mxo has no 10bit
support....

http://www.matrox.com/video/media/pdf/products/mxo/de_product_selection.pdf

 

[Brian Broz]

So assuming the Apple 23" Display will support 10 bit over HDMI then it looks like the MXO2 will be the best solution (?).
But I never assume anything

 

[Brandon Fraley]

the mxo has no 10bit support....

what??? eww

 

[Daniel Browning]

EIZO CG241W is at the top of my current list of 'budget' displays due to its wide gamut color panel and 16 bit luma processor and 12 bit lookup (gamma). Those are good features for grading.

That's only true when grading the feature in the same wide gamut as the panel, which is invariably AdobeRGB. Features that go to filmout, DCI, and other 10-bit+ outputs could benefit from that; however, when things get down to the level of Blu-ray, internet distribution, and most NLE, the only color gamuts that matter for HD are rec709 and sRGB. This is obviously a far more common situation, and there are two reasons why current wide gamut monitors are not accurate for grading it.

First, the panels only display 96% of the *eight* bit AdobeRGB space. So when an 8-bit rec709 is displayed on a wide gamut panel, it is converted to a 12-bit AdobeRGB value in the LUT (this value looks exactly the same as the 8-bit sRGB value), but then (and here's the kicker), it's converted to an 8-bit Adobe RGB value for display. This does not look the same. It's still 8-bits input and 8-bits output: what happens in the middle cannot help that.

Here is an illustration:

8-bit sRGB is like 10 to 50, counting by 5 (10, 15, 20, ...).
8-bit AdobeRGB is like 10 to 100, counting by 10 (10, 20, 30, ...).

When you display an sRGB "25" on the AdobeRGB panel, the closest thing it can convert it to is a 20 or 30.

10-bit AdobeRGB is like 10 to 100 counting by 1 (10, 11, 12, ...). Therefore, mapping the sRGB 25 is very accurate.

If the wide gamut display could display 96% of the *10-bit* AdobeRGB space, things would be different. But as long as you are converting between two 8-bit spaces, no amount of LUT will help.

Furthermore, even if you have a true 10-bit wide-gamut display ($3000 for 17" right now), the only benefit right now is accurate color space conversion of 8-bit material: there is *still* no way to transfer 10-bits to the display through existing operating systems. Dual-link HD-SDI and HDMI 1.3 are the only options, and they're handled by special hardware.

All that is to say that I recommend a top notch, highly accurate sRGB display for rec709 video. The NEC LCD2490WUXi fits the bill for around $1200. Just change the white point from native to sRGB and it's ready to go. IPS-derivitive panels like that can sometimes has too-slow pixel-response times for moving images, but the NEC does well enough in that regard (YMMV) and it's more accurate than XVA-derivitives.

For super budget conscious folks, or as a desktop companion to something like a Cine-tal or EIZO, the DELL 2408FWP seems like a nice monitor, especially at just over $600. I've got one coming in a few days so I'll report back when I've had a chance to bang on it a little harder. It's got wide gamut color, excellent brightness and contrast, and coupled with color management software should function reasonably well for color work as long as it's not a critical application. It's also got HDMI and DVI inputs, as well as analog, which is quite nice for a computer monitor.

But none of this matters without color management. Your monitor can cost $20k, but it's still not enough to be sure that what it's displaying makes sense in relation to what your work will be seen on.

That's true for print photography where the color changes slightly for every variation of printer, ink, and paper (and even what batch of ink and paper). However, the distribution of video content is far more standardized: Rec. 601, Rec. 709, and sRGB. (Excluding filmout, DCI, etc.). That's not to say that every (or even *any*) two displays will be the same, but that they're all supposed to be trying to implement the same standard. A true sRGB display will be calibrated perfectly at the factory and not require any additional calibration.

So assuming the Apple 23" Display will support 10 bit over HDMI...

It's not a 10-bit display.

 

[Cüneyt Kaya]

So assuming the Apple 23" Display will support 10 bit over HDMI then it looks like the MXO2 will be the best solution (?).
But I never assume anything

the mxo2 has no DVI in...same link
this sucks!

but the hdmi way is still interesting if someone knows more about this solution

 

[Steve Sanacore]

My understanding is the Dell and the apple displays are exactly the same. (anyone able to confirm this) If true then the Dell would be the cheaper choice

I thought that too. I read some reviews recently on the 30" displays and the Apple's color was more accurate. The LCD panels are the same but the software and hardware that drives them is different I guess.

 

[John Tissavary]

First, the panels only display 96% of the *eight* bit AdobeRGB space. So when an 8-bit rec709 is displayed on a wide gamut panel, it is converted to a 12-bit AdobeRGB value in the LUT (this value looks exactly the same as the 8-bit sRGB value), but then (and here's the kicker), it's converted to an 8-bit Adobe RGB value for display. This does not look the same. It's still 8-bits input and 8-bits output: what happens in the middle cannot help that.

Very good points, but though this is an issue, with proper 3d color management it's minimized into a manageable range imho.

With a good quality probe and proper software like Cinespace a 3d model of the color and luma output of both the target and work display devices can be created, then your particular display device can be re-mapped to the target device via this 3d lut. There will obviously be some errors/differences, I believe that in the cases you have presented they will be so minute as to not cause practical problems except in the most critical of situations.

BTW, my Toshiba Regza 42" lcd tv has a 10bit panel, and costs under $2k, so I predict prices & availability are going to change pretty drastically for this technology in the near future.


cheers,

John T.

 

[Petr Dvorak]

With LCD I'm bit confused now. I heard that any LCD panels can only reproduce 8 bit of colors. Even manufacturers (like some EIZO) which talk about 10 bits, only reproduce 8 bits (they work with 10 bit colors internally).
So I wonder how many bits of colors can reproduce old CRTs?
What is better for gradind CRT or LCD and how graders can live with 8 bit color displays now???
Nevertheless some people CC on notebooks which are all 6 bit!!!

Not 100% sure about it but EIZO, Apple, Dell, even e-Cinema displays probably use same 8 bit Samsung LCD panels (because there are just few LCD manufactures) so everything else is about electronics and advertising.

 

[Daniel Browning]

Very good points, but though this is an issue, with proper 3d color management it's minimized into a manageable range imho.

With a good quality probe and proper software like Cinespace a 3d model of the color and luma output of both the target and work display devices can be created, then your particular display device can be re-mapped to the target device via this 3d lut. There will obviously be some errors/differences, I believe that in the cases you have presented they will be so minute as to not cause practical problems except in the most critical of situations.

Maybe you're right. There are certainly more important things that people get wrong more often: such as using 6-bit panels, bright backlights, and inaccurate colors.

But to me, the difference is between a nice, warm skin tone, and a face that is a little too red. 8-bit rec709 is already too granular (quantized) and making the distance between colors even greater makes a bad problem worse.

I remember seeing the 8-bit sRGB to 8-bit AdobeRGB conversion chart on the internet somewhere, it shows the distance between the points on a plane. Some of them (especially the reds) are pretty long.

BTW, my Toshiba Regza 42" lcd tv has a 10bit panel, and costs under $2k, so I predict prices & availability are going to change pretty drastically for this technology in the near future.

Agreed. I think the next big step will be a relatively inexpensive HDMI 1.3 10-bit card, like the BM Intensity, and software to fully support it as a 10-bit path like the current HD-SDI cards. Unfortunately, most of the consumer 10-bit sets aren't color-accurate (yet).

With LCD I'm bit confused now. I heard that any LCD panels can only reproduce 8 bit of colors. Even manufacturers (like some EIZO) which talk about 10 bits, only reproduce 8 bits (they work with 10 bit colors internally).

That's correct. (Some manufactuers talk about their 10-bit, 12-bit, or 14-bit LUT despite the fact that it's just an 8-bit to 8-bit conversion.)

Nevertheless some people CC on notebooks which are all 6 bit!!!

Some people also mix audio for -3 RMS and use a hundred different wipes and transitions. The most common problem I see is having the brightness turned up as high as possible, in a darkened room. Unfortunately, most consumers do the same thing, so they might not notice the problem until they do a filmout or see it in a calibrated environment.

Not 100% sure about it but EIZO, Apple, Dell, even e-Cinema displays probably use same 8 bit Samsung LCD panels (because there are just few LCD manufactures) so everything else is about electronics and advertising.

Keep in mind that panels are sorted and sold by quality. And don't discount the value of electronics. The backlight has a big impact on image quality (brightness, evenness, color temperature, etc.). The backlights in all my displays have worn unevenly, so that after just a year or two one side has a slightly different color cast. (Just like older Kinoflows sometimes have slightly different color temps.)

Also keep in mind that most manufacturers will change the panel on a whim. Dell is notorious for teasing buyers with top notch X-IPS panels, then switch to a much junkier panel in later shipments (for the same exact model number and product specifications).

 

[Petr Dvorak]

...
Also keep in mind that most manufacturers will change the panel on a whim. Dell is notorious for teasing buyers with top notch X-IPS panels, then switch to a much junkier panel in later shipments (for the same exact model number and product specifications).

Yep, I know, I hate this. Same like with some 2GB USB Flash Drives - 1st GB was quick RAM and 2nd RAM was cheaper slower one. :angry03:

I heard that Apple maybe put only 6 bit LCD panels in some 20" iMacs, beware. But in specification they talk about Millions of colors insteads of thousands :angry2: