Just wanted to drop a huge thanks to the regular contributors and gurus here for the fantastic resources and stickies! I'm visiting from the dedicated theater build forum, and on the job I'm a visual designer that sometimes has to do basic automated monitor calibration, so I figured that I'd print out some of the guides here, learn a bit more theory, take a Spyder2 home for the weekend, and just give it a shot with no big expectations.

I recently finished building a dedicated HT with an Optoma HD7100, which by lucky coincidence turns out to have decent white balance and CMS controls in the service menu (drive and offsets for RGBCYM). I had previously done "calibrations" qualitatively with filters and Avia to set color and tint etc, but after spending a few hours with the forum resources and HCFR, I was just blown away by the results.

Obviously, it's an amateur first effort and could use a bit more tweaking, but I have to say that the overall effect, especially with a well-mastered BD disc, were absolutely worth the 4 or 5 hours I put in. It was a very rewarding project, made even more worthwhile when my wife (who sometimes has difficulty differentiating SD from HD :p) said unprompted afterwards: "those colors look really....great!"

Pre-calibration (Factory ISF Night setting, 6500K):

http://www.winterpost.com/dave/uncal-rgb.jpg

http://www.winterpost.com/dave/uncal-temp.jpg

http://www.winterpost.com/dave/uncal-cie.jpg


Post-calibration:

http://www.winterpost.com/dave/cal-rgb.jpg

http://www.winterpost.com/dave/cal-temp.jpg

http://www.winterpost.com/dave/cal-cie.jpg


I forgot to copy over the HCFR file or gamma charts so I don't have them with me, but overall I'm thrilled with the results. Most of the RGB levels for grey tracking are within 5-8 dE and the primaries and secondaries within about 10-12 dE, which is fine for me given the time I spent. Some quick fixes I'm contemplating:

- Red is still a bit off in the greyscale. It seems a bit peaky down low, but then it drops for the rest of the range so I suspect it might be sensor error at low light levels. But if I drop red offset a notch, how high up the scale would the effect be noticeable? It also seems to pop back up at 100IRE, so I'm hesitant to drive red gain any harder....

- My gamma is relatively flat near 2.2, but it drops off quite a bit at 90IRE and up ... I think I'm supposed to lower master contrast a bit, but will it affect anything else other than that?

- I calibrated for a PS3 via HDMI, which is my usual source for BD and DVD. I had neither the time nor appropriate test signals for the PVR (HD broadcast) via component, so I just duplicated the other settings. How "off" would one expect the inputs to be?

Thanks so much again to the experts here for some great resources. It's really added to the enjoyment of my HT.