I'm confused/unclear about black levels. I'm new to HD and have been wanting to dive in for a while now, can someone better explain black levels? I think I know but I'm not positive.

For example some of my favorite movies happened to be filmed at night or have several dark scenes in them.
Underworld:Evolution for example.
Do I want a TV with the best black levels or highest contrast to fully appreciate the dark scenes in Underworld?
or do I want a brighter TV if most of my favorite movies happen to be filmed dark like the Matrix trilogy or the Cave or the Decent?

I'm confused/unclear about black levels. I'm new to HD and have been wanting to dive in for a while now, can someone better explain black levels? I think I know but I'm not positive.

For example some of my favorite movies happened to be filmed at night or have several dark scenes in them. Underworld:Evolution for example.
Do I want a TV with the best black levels or highest contrast to fully apreciate the dark scenes in Underworld? or do I want a brighter TV if most of my favorite movies happen to be filmed dark like the Matrix trilogy or the Cave or the Decent?

What I use to compare black levels are the bars on the sides when watching a 4:3 show or 2:35:1 movie. The darker the bars, the more deep blacks the television can produce.

What I use to compare black levels are the bars on the sides when watching a 4:3 show or 2:35:1 movie. The darker the bars, the more deep blacks the television can produce.

Hmm, isn't the "darkness" of those bars adjustable in some sets????

Therefore, how do we know if the bars are as "dark" as what the set is capable of displaying?? :confused:

Hmm, isn't the "darkness" of those bars adjustable in some sets????

Therefore, how do we know if the bars are as "dark" as what the set is capable of displaying?? :confused:

You get the TVs in the dark, so that light will not shield the TVs 'black' performance. You then take a look at really dark portions of the picture as well as really dark scenes.

Yes you can adjust by using the 'brightness' setting on TVs. But there is only so much you can do. There's a point where a TV's level a black cannot get any darker... even if you push the brightness setting to nothing.

The black you get there is the darkest it will ever be. A good test is to turn a TV an all black screen, and keep kickin the brightness setting down until you can't get it any darker.

I'm confused/unclear about black levels. I'm new to HD and have been wanting to dive in for a while now, can someone better explain black levels? I think I know but I'm not positive.

For example some of my favorite movies happened to be filmed at night or have several dark scenes in them.
Underworld:Evolution for example.
Do I want a TV with the best black levels or highest contrast to fully appreciate the dark scenes in Underworld?
or do I want a brighter TV if most of my favorite movies happen to be filmed dark like the Matrix trilogy or the Cave or the Decent?

You want the TVs w/ the best blacks for sure. Blacks and contrast go hand in hand. In the dark you don't need your TV to be mega-bright like at the store. You need a deep black because you cannot compensate by cranking the contrast to 100.... that'll be suicide for your eyes.

Blacks will make the picture look inherently contrastier.

What I use to compare black levels are the bars on the sides when watching a 4:3 show or 2:35:1 movie. The darker the bars, the more deep blacks the television can produce.

That would not be the best way to check. ;)

contrastier?
Do I want a TV with the highest contrast then? The Panasonic 50" 1080p Flat-Panel Plasma HDTV
Model: TH-50PZ750 has 5000:1 contrast ratio, whereas the
Samsung 50" 1080p Flat-Panel Plasma HDTV
Model: FP-T5084 has 15000:1 contrast ratio.
So the Samsung would be better right?

contrastier?
Do I want a TV with the highest contrast then? The Panasonic 50" 1080p Flat-Panel Plasma HDTV
Model: TH-50PZ750 has 5000:1 contrast ratio, whereas the
Samsung 50" 1080p Flat-Panel Plasma HDTV
Model: FP-T5084 has 15000:1 contrast ratio.
So the Samsung would be better right?

NO. NO. I REPEAT. DO NOT GO BY THE MANUFACTURER RATING.

...

Now that I got your attention. It's best for you to go see for yourself. Or get somebody who has impressions and hands-on experience with both. I believe history says the Panasonic has the better black level.

The 750 and the 50 inch 1080p Panny should have a similar black level.

The other thing is, if you are to look at manufacturers number, before you are comparing static contrast ratios to static ones and not dynamic ones. Most LCDs list dynamic and not static.

Russ

NO. NO. I REPEAT. DO NOT GO BY THE MANUFACTURER RATING.

...

Now that I got your attention. It's best for you to go see for yourself. Or get somebody who has impressions and hands-on experience with both. I believe history says the Panasonic has the better black level.

The 750 and the 50 inch Panny should have a similar black level.

Keep in mind that there are three things that go into the contrast ratio measurement. You have the maximum level of white the TV can produce, and this is divided by the lowest level of black. Strictly speaking, this is the contrast ratio, however, the third element in the quoted number is the manufacturer's BS.

Take, for example, the panny pz700 series. These plasmas produce (according to most reports) the deepest blacks around (at least before the pio kuro series came out.) However, the small pixels on the panny don't pump out as much light as other plasmas, and the reduced brightness results in a modest 5000:1 rating. In most situations it puts out plenty of light, so this isn't an issue. But if you happen to have a very bright room, it would be worth your while to get a TV that generates it's high contrast from it's whites rather than it's blacks. You will lose shadow detail in this situation, but at least you will be able to see the picture.

I was in Best Buy last week and they had Underworld playing on the Panasonic TH-50PZ750. It was really dark and not as good as I'd hoped. They didn't have the Samsung FP-T5084 so I couldn't compare. They did have a Pioneer 5080 but it was getting a diferent feed. Actually a better feed. It seemed that the pictures being shown in the Magnolia room looked worse than the pictures on the TV's on the other side. Anyway the Pioneer looked better but it wasn't receiving the same feed so I don't know for sure. And the Pioneer wasn't in 1080p either.

I was in Best Buy last week and they had Underworld playing on the Panasonic TH-50PZ750. It was really dark and not as good as I'd hoped. They didn't have the Samsung FP-T5084 so I couldn't compare. They did have a Pioneer 5080 but it was getting a diferent feed. Actually a better feed. It seemed that the pictures being shown in the Magnolia room looked worse than the pictures on the TV's on the other side. Anyway the Pioneer looked better but it wasn't receiving the same feed so I don't know for sure. And the Pioneer wasn't in 1080p either.

I felt the same way about the 750, too much black crush (can't distinguish different levels of black.) I ended up with the pio 5080.
Don't confuse black crush with blacks. They are very different things. You want the displays blacks to be as dark as possible, but would still want to be able to distinguish different levels of black. Essentially have more steps.

As for 1080p. Unless you are very close to a very big TV you won't notice the difference. There are any number of threads on that topic.

I think a better way to view this is the shades between pure black and pure white. The difference between these two can be very large but if you go from black to white with too few shades in between, you have very little defintion in your picture, whether it's in the blacks or in the whites. Most sets in stores are set to torch, so you don't see a lot of gradients between black to white, dark to light. I played around with settings in a lot of stores and a lot of different TVs and found, TO MY EYES, that plasma had a more natural transition from dark to light than LCDs. There was more detail in the dark areas and more detail in the bright areas. This is real important in those dark movies you mention. LCDs did, however, appear to have "purer" blacks and whites and solid colors, more like a cartoon or painting.

However, YMMV. :)