*Unofficial* Mitsubishi HC3800 Thread - Page 200

Originally Posted by mp06011999

I posted about this awhile back thinking the HC3800 was having a problem connecting to the PS3 over 24 feet of HDMI, but spent more time trying "process of elimination" to get a clearer understanding of what is happening. AND, this is probably the wrong thread to post it in since it seems to be more of a BD issue rather than a HC3800 one.

Here's the scoop:
I get white flashes or flickers on the projected image during Blu-ray source material in scenes with alot of dark images, especially night scenes. They are there at the exact same time stamp of the material and only on the recorded material, not outside it in the letterbox black bars of the recorded material. I can actually pause the BD player on a flash and it will hold it there. We discussed this on here before and most comments thought it was a connection issue causing digital dropout. It does not appear to be anything with connections and I will explain that in a second. If I knew what the flashes were called I could Google it perhaps with better success. NOW, here's what I have done to narrow it down:

I played the exact same three BD discs on two different displays with two different BD players and with several different HDMI cables and component cables. Here are the results:
First, the cables and BD players made no difference whatsoever. HDMI, component, 6 feet, 24 feet, direct connect, through a switcher or not, PS3 or cheap Magnavox BD player mattered not. Nothing I did with the length of the run, the type of cables (HDMI or component) or what player or even what display made it go away. Only dumbing down the image at the BD player to 720p made it go away - mostly. It only happens on certain Blu rays and only in images with dark material. It is blatantly obvious on the 144 inch display that I have the HC3800 shooting. It seems to be getting worse as a problem (more BD discs with it) with the more current Blu rays out there. DVDs, games and OTA HD signals never do it, only BD. And more so with the more current BDs.

The difference in the severity of the artifact from the 50 inch plasma or projected at 144 inches from HC3800 display seemed only to be due to the size difference. Ya know, make the picture bigger and everything is magnified...like these flashes. Hence why this may be the wrong thread for this. And maybe why I am having a hard time finding others with this issue. It is not "really" an issue on the 50 inch plasma. But shoot 144 inch image and it is a BIG problem.

Anyhow, the only way I found to make the flashes disappear was to dumb down the output. Drop the BD player's (both of them) output to 720p (from 1080i, p or p/24) and the flashes become almost undetectable on the 144 inch display. They are a complete non-issue on the 50 inch plasma...but they are still there if you really try hard to see them, letting me know that they are not truly gone, just a non-issue at anything smaller than 51 inches.
On the 144 inch display of the HC3800 the flashes are extremely distracting on some BD sources if I output at anything over 720p.

So, I have dropped the output of all my BD players to 720p, including the PS3. Too many times, especially of late, I am hosting a movie and in a dark scene (like the bar scene in Captain America, the tiger night attack in BBC's Earth and most of Super 8 since the entire movie is shot WAY TOO DARK) these distracting white flashes happen. I spent an entire day trying every single connection and setting you could imagine with all these cables, players and displays and I am 100% confident that this is a BD issue, not even an HDMI issue. But what is it and why? And please, sorry for posting it here, but this is my projector and if I'm having these issues and thought it was the HC3800 at first then I bet others have too. I am confident that it is a common BD artifact that is only magnified by the 144 inch image of the HC3800 and therefore probably not noticeable to the masses with much smaller displays.

Please advise if you know what this apparent BD ONLY issue seems to be and thank you.

Originally Posted by Legairre

BTW someone in the link suggested turning off any dynamic contrast which for us 3800 owners would be brilliant color. I tried and it made no difference.

Originally Posted by Selden Ball

mp06011999,
...The fact that you don't see sparklies in the upper and lower black bands of widescreen movies implies that the flashes are not due to signal degradation in the cables.

Your description really sounds like the video noise you're seeing is due to a poor signal coming off the BD disc itself. From what you say, the flashes would seem to be present in the signal recorded on the discs, especially if the white flashes always are in the same place when you review a particular scene. Pixels which are present on the disc but lost during playback are supposed to be repaired by the error correcting codes designed into the BD video and playback electronics.

Downgrading BD's native 1080 signal to 720p forces the player to blend video scanlines together. I'd expect this to disguise white flashes originating from the discs.

I assume you've tried gently cleaning the discs, and that they aren't scratched.

In my search, I found a useful suggestion of turning down the picture sharpness setting. This worked for me and you could try it. Even in light of the dark scene issues, the video is wonderful and I would still buy again."

Originally Posted by DaGamePimp

Hey Jim,

I don't have it powered up at the moment and did not write down the settings as of yet but I do seem to recall hitting -12 on Contrast. The cal ran me into the wee hours of the morning (got a late start) but I think I was bouncing back and forth from -13 to -12 and settled on -12. I also noticed a pretty drastic color shift in the ballpark of where you noticed it, I think mine was shifting at about -7.

* I should add that I do use a High Power screen so I get a 30-40% boost, I can see -12 being a bit dim on a matte screen.

Jason

Originally Posted by DaGamePimp

Jim,

Just about any/every digital display will clip colors if the contrast is pushed too far, this is normal, and yes my 3800 will clip Red along with several other colors if contrast is set too high. Your eyes should see the red/pink push a bit easier if you toss up full field 100 IRE, give your eyes a minute to adjust. This can be tough though depending on what your eyes/brain are accustomed to viewing.

Jason

Originally Posted by Jim McC

Full field 100 IRE? I have the S & M cal. disc and the AVS HD709 test patterns. Do either of these have that test pattern? Thanks.

Originally Posted by DaGamePimp

Yes, they both have it from what I recall (full field WHITE @ 100 IRE). I don't use either very often since I use a pc to do calibrations. If you have a pc connected to your 3800 you can use something like Colorfacts test patterns.

Jason