Contrast VS Resolution
 

I'm looking for a monitor to hook up to my Final Cut Pro Editing System via the Kona HD component out. Many of you purchased the Dell 2405. I was in Best Buy today and looked at the Samsung 26" LCD HDTV (LNR268W). The Samsung was the nicest looking LCD in the store. Obviously, these are both not pro SDI monitors, but I will have to pick one because I can't spend over $1,300.00. Here's the big difference between these monitors (as far as I can tell): The Dell is 1920x1200 resolution and the contrast is 1000:1. The Samsung is 1366x768 resolution and the contrast is 3000:1. Which is better? If the HVX200 (the camera that provides the footage I will edit) is not capable of reaching the max resolution of either one of these monitors, then is contrast more important (please educate me if I am wrong about the resolution of the HVX)? If you have other monitor ideas, I'm all ears. Thanks for the help!

Also, Contrast VS Resolution also brings up a point about the HVX VS the Canon HDV Camera, in the end we may find out that (if we already haven't confirmed this) that the Canon puts out a higher resolution image. There has been some discussion that in progressive mode (or whatever you want to call it), the Canon is not that much better in then the HVX (correct me if I'm wrong). In the end, if it comes down to a small difference in resolution, contrast and the quality of the filmlook, which camera would you pick (this may be a premature question until more test are done, but the question reminds us that a camera is more than just resolution -- although that is obviously very important).

I really liked the steadicam 24p clip shot by the HVX200. It looked a lot like film. It looked a little crushed for my taste and a bit noisy, but maybe that can be fixed by messing around with camera settings. I would love to see a quicktime file of the Canon in 24p (or whatever they call the progressive mode -- I'm not mocking that camera -- it looks like a very nice machine). Can anyone point me in the right direction? There seems to be more HVX footage on the web, but not much Canon that I can watch on my Mac.

actually i don't think cameras are rated in contrast. i think they're rated in something similar called latitude.

Great question, Jay. I was just looking at that new 30" Dell. Wonder how the HVX would look on this baby. Nice resolution! Although, not interested due to the lack of component inputs (looking for ext monitor for HVX). Wonder why they left out component??? Contrast ratio for this baby is 700:1. Would the contrast ratio of the Samsung improve the image much more? Maybe somebody with experience can chime in.

Contrast ratios quoted by different manufacturers are notoriously flaky (like amplifiers and watts per channel). And no wonder - it is the weakest point of all LCD/Plasma screens when compared to CRT's which typically have contrast ratios of 20,000:1 and above. The higher the figure, the better the difference between peak white and the darkest blacks. However I would trust my eyes more than manufacturer quoted figures.

The best test is to see how dark scenes pan out - the better the contrast ratio, the less tendency there is for blacks to clump together into an indistinguishable muddy mess i.e. the more detail you see in the blacks.

I'd also look at how well the internal scaler in the unit works - most of them re-compress the image and bring in a lot of unwanted MPEG artifacting. Being able to display the native resolution is ideal.

I just got my Dell 2405 HD monitor today. It's awesome. The 1920x1080 is not forgiving though. You feed it a bad, soft or low res image and it shows...

pappas

It's just false advertising. The manufacturers inflate the contrast ratio spec, because consumers look for it.

Some info on contrast ratio:
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/...1734400,00.asp

How they inflate:
For the peak measurement (how high contrast goes), the manufacturers set the monitor to max out its R, G, and B elements. Your monitor will not actually come like that though.
They also don't use a standard method of measuring contrast ratio.

So I'm getting some mixed info here. This is a tough decision. It sounds like contrast ratios are over inflated and may not mean that much. I liked the Samsung because I was able to see it in person and it looked much better than the other monitors around it (with the same resolution -- there were no monitors with higher resolution around it). I would buy the Dell (if having slightly higher resolution would make a difference). Does having more resolution help an image even though the image/video fed to it is much lower quality? I guess that's the most important question. In the end, would a 720p HVX image look about the same on both monitors? What cameras are able to take advantage of full 1080 HD resolution? Are they (those cameras) not going to be way out of my budget anyway? Am I missing something here?

You could buy 100 shares of Apple stock and probably end up with a free SED television next year. 100,000:1 contrast ratio claimed. Anybody ever see one of these in person?

I would love to buy some apple stock, but all of my money is tied up in the HVX200. Damn!!!

in the world of higher end display devices, most people care more about contrast than resolution--it's what gives the image depth. let your eyes judge contrast--not manufacturer numbers.

I went with the Samsung. It's a very nice monitor. It's less resolution (compared to the Dell), but seeing it with my own eyes in the store against 20 other LCD's did it for me. It was the clear winner. I would not be able to see the Dell next to all of those monitors (I wish that was an option). I asked AJA about the best way to color correct HVX DVCPRO HD footage in Final Cut Pro. He said a standard def NTSC calibrated monitor would be pretty accurate if the Kona LH downconvert was set to Component (SMPTE/EBU N10). So I guess I will edit using the Samsung and watch the beautiful footage in all its glory. When I do important color correcting, I will switch to my old reliable Sony SD monitor and watch the Final Cut Pro scopes. I imagine that the higher resolution Dell Monitor wouldn't make my 720p footage look and better than the Samsung, right (not resolution wise anyway)?

Traditional CRT does about 27,000:1. Not that you actually achieve it in practice. The extremetech article shows about 90:1 in practice... less than the other type of displays.

Contrast is also affected by room illumination hitting the monitor, and also by surround illuminantion determining how far black you can see. CRTs may fare better when you take these things into consideration. LCDs in comparison have a black level that doesn't go very low, which means they benefit from brighter gamma and from brighter surround illuminantion.

Until that happens, it'll be hard to tell how good SED displays actually will be. It'll be interesting to see how it pans out... if they can get it manufactured cheap and figure out the technicalities to them, then it should take off.

Where do they get these figures?
Every decent (not broken) crt should be able to show 0.1cd/m2 black level and 100cd/m2 white level, which leads to 1000:1.
This can be of course ruined by pointing a light to display, but that can be avoided...