I know there's been alot of discussions on the detrimental side effects of dynamic iris (brightness compression, pumping/breathing black levels), but can anyone recommend certain scenes that would give DI difficulty? Then perhaps people with DI projectors (Sony, Epson, Panasonic, etc) can comment on how visible DI artifacts are in those scenes.

One example I've seen mentioned in the opening scene of Star Wars Ep: starts of with mostly empty, black space so the iris clamps down, then as the star destroyer enters and eventually fill the screen, the iris opens up so the black space gradually gets lighter.

Thanks!

I know it's not really a valid example but DI action is obvious at either the beginning or end of credits on a black background. As the amout of text on the screen increases or decreases it's very easy to see the brightness of the text changing.

Let's also not forget that the gamma fluctuations cause differences in the final image, regardless of whether or not typical DI "artifacts" are visible in a particular scene. For this very reason, I prefer to run my Sony Pearl with the Manual Iris clamped down to about 75 (running in a constant Gamma3) as opposed to using the DI. I'm just not a big fan of the DI. Just my personal preference.

I also find mid-APL scenes with high dynamic range to be a lot "poppier" with the DI turned off.

The point I'm trying to make here is that you can often discern important differences in "non-DI" vs. "DI" operation for any given scene, even without the presence of what we'd consider traditional DI artificats (like pumping or brightness compression).