I am curious about something.

I recently bought the DV953 and just recently did a lot of filming. When I connected the camera to the TV directly and played back the footage, I noticed that the color on the TV was noticeably different than what I saw on the 953 LCD screen. I played around with the TV to try to get a more accurate color reproduction but I could not. The colors from the LCD are completely accurate from what I remember the real colors to be.

Also I noticed that a halo effect I could see on the TV (for example when the top of a mountain is visible against the sky) but I don't see it on the LCD.

I have not transfered the footage to a computer and burned DVDs which I plan to do in the future.

Do you think I will see accurate color reproduction and no halo effects when I burn some DVDs ?

Also, has anyone else noticed what I noticed ?

The halo is seen on most consumer minidv cams, especially with hard sharpening. The Mx500 /DV953 is pretty famous in this area.

The TV should be your final target, not the LCD. Why? If you set your TV to the brightness, contrast and saturation that you like, especially while watching National Geographic or a typical movie (The Matrix will be too blue or too green, hehehe), then you should link the cam to you TV and tweak the cam to match what you like to see on the TV. You can then try to calibrate the LCD monitor on the cam. If you have reach the max and can't tweek any further, just remember how much you need to 'offset' the colours everytime you shoot.

And as for trasnfers to DVD and PC, what you see is what you get. The halos will still be there. And due to further digital sharpening on the DVD compression, the halos may even be more pronounced.

My DVDs look pretty good on my Mitsubishi HDTV...close to what the LCD displays. Could be your TV set's composite circuitry. There will usually be some difference between the LCD and a TV because they use different methods of producing color and have different color temperatures. Why don't you take it to a friend's house and see if it looks different.

You can cut down some on the edge enhancement by using manual and putting sharpness at 0. However, the camcorder has to stay in manual when you shoot or auto will put it right back. If you have the right video editing software, you can correct the color balance and accuracy. But remember, if you make it look good on your TV, it may not look good on all TVs.

Guy,

I too am suspecting the colors from the TV and will try viewing the video on a different TV. I also noticed the color difference when viewing my still photos on my TV.

Thanks for the advice.

Calibrate that TV with some Digital Video Essentials or AVIA!