Panasonic Viera TC-P50VT25 Settings

[Johnny Friday]

Can anyone offer any recommendations for initial settings for the Panasonic Viera Plasma 3d TV?

I purchased one from B&H and it is replacing my Phillips 42" LCD. I find the color renditions to be very poor as well as it seems to blow out whites in the 90+ range on my scopes. At the moment i find that my Phillips LCD offers WAY BETTER color rendition. Colors on the panni seem very flat and just not alive.

I'm monitoring my output via Matrox MXO2LE via HDMI (10bit) from FCP and just not seeing anything close to what i see on my dreamcolor monitor or my workstation LCD's. I've also done my initial setup and Bars correction via MATROX and into the blue channel to get my bars all setup and that sets fine.

Again, back to monitoring....just not seeing anything very admirable. In fact far off from even close.

Thanks for any advise.

 

[Jeff Kilgroe]

They take a LOT of adjustment.

Don't waste your time making adjustments until you have 150 hours of use on the monitor anyway -- need to "break it in".

Some decent general settings to start with are:

Picture Mode - THX
Contrast: +90 (yes, really)
Brightness: +50 (it's going to seem a bit dull)
Color: +58
Temp neutral: 0 / neutral
Sharpness: +70 (but depends on viewing distance, etc..)
Color Temp: Warm1
Color Mgmt: On
C.A.T.S: Off
Video NR: Weak
Blur Reduction: OFF !!!!!!
HDMI/DVI RGB range: nonstandard is useful for 0-255 range
Block NR: Off unless you're watching broadcast TV
Advanced --->
Mosquito NR: Off
Black Level: Dark

Adjust all above to taste somewhat, but this is just for the break-in period. OK, come back after you have at least 100 hours of operation on the thing...

After that, you will change to the picture mode to Custom and do lots of tweaking, but I've worked with three of these panels so far and all have been pretty different in response, so you will want a good color probe and signal generator. I have not been able to dial in one of these VT25 monitors 100% just by the onboard "Pro" controls where you set color balance, channel saturation, etc.. You are going to need to generate an additional LUT for whatever output device you are using. Or if you're using an HDLink, MXO2 or similar as an intermediate device.

 

[Johnny Friday]

Jeff:
thanks for the reply. Yes, i think i'm close to about 80-100 hours at the moment of allowing the monitor to just run with random tv pumping through it. In fact, basic broadcast tv here in mexico--i have 4 channels-- is so bad, i think that this is effecting my resolution and overall poor monitoring. Novellas and mexican infa-mercials probably have very negative effects.

But I'll try this in another 50 or so hours. But funny how i can't wrap my head around why that would then all of a sudden make my monitor just "POP". but maybe it will .

One thing i can say about putting color bars up ouf of my I/O box--Matrox MXO2LE....is that when i callibrated the monitor to the HD color bars, it was so close to the panasonic original settings. That was quite impressive.

I think however the dull colors and just flat resolution likely have something to do with the panasonic internal settings. But one thing i know is there sure seems to be a big difference in LCD & LED monitors vs. Plasma. The former really seem to have more "pop" factor and not as dull.....at least at this point in my viewing.

More to follow on this as i get to 150-200 hours.
Thanks Jeff...

BTW: you mentioned "Temperature Neutral 0" where is that setting or is that under the setting of "warm1"?