Official Panasonic 2012 Lineup and Information Thread [No Price Talk] - Page 52

Confuse me if I'm wrong, but I seem to remember D-Nice (and some others) mention that both the 48hz of the ST/GT and the 96hz on the VT produce almost identical quality motion... and not very good at that.

The 60hz mode while perhaps having mild judder produced the better motion overall and was the preferred.

Does anyone else remember this? Is it not true? (I'm sure personal preferences are involved with this.)

To be honest, I didn't pay a whole lot of attention to the 2011 Panasonics, but I do know that 96Hz had false contouring issues on the VT30 that made it not used by most people. This year, I have seen no mention of this issue, so I assume it has been fixed.

48Hz and 96Hz probably do handle motion similarly, but because 48Hz is too low of a refresh rate, there's way too much flicker. I heard D-Nice mention at the shootout that he noticed some mild flicker at 96Hz, but Robert said that he didn't notice any and it has been improved significantly this year. Nothing is going to save 48Hz, though... that will always be a useless setting. I believe avjunkie (Panasonic insider at the other site) has even said that he has asked for it to be removed.

My brother has an ST30 and I quicky switched it to 48Hz and it was VERY distracting.

not expensive

Where can I find D-Nice's review of the VT50? Is there a link? I've been querying the thread to no avail...
Would appreciate some help in pointing me in the right direction.
Thanks,
Spiffx

Since D-Nice either missed this, or prefers not to respond, is there another calibrator around who can answer this?

I'm not sure of all the menu options for the GT50 but a good grayscale (white balance) calibration will do wonders for the picture. If the color CMS is there too then there will be significant improvement in the picture over THX.
I have a VT50 and I put my settings here: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...7#post22062107. You could copy your current settings and try these, at least the ones available in Custom, and see if they make a difference. I'm sure they won't work on some sets but a few have had pretty good results with them.

No CMS on the ST50 and according to Chad B's review gamma isn't very good in Cinema. After much questioning about the ST50 vs GT50, D-Nice said to get day and night modes on the ST50 just calibrate 2 modes. I just don't see how you can get TWO modes equal, or better than, what the GT50 has to offer with gamma being too low on the ST50's Cinema mode and no CMS adjustments available.

high def junkies dot com

reviews tab

D-Nice: Calibrations, Settings, & Reviews

VT50 will be posted in June

As sheshechic points out, you must become a member to view. Easy to do.

It would have to be through the service menu and of course I wouldn't recommend that unless you know exactly what you're doing.

^^^^ You must be a member to access that thread.

I don't have a problem getting a satisfying gamma from Cinema mode. Niether displays have CMS controls.

Actually I do. I just have not posted any yet.

Gamma cannot be adjusted through the service menu on the ST50 -

From Chad B's review: "I calibrated Cinema mode first, going into the service menu to adjust grayscale. However, there is no adjustment for gamma (brightness of mid tones) in Cinema mode in either the service menu or user menu, and measurements showed the gamma was not ideal. This gave Cinema mode a slightly washed out look, robbing it of depth and dimensionality.

Custom mode was next, and in that mode gamma and light output could both be improved over Cinema mode."

Unlike the VT50, neither the ST50 nor the GT50 have 10 point controls available. The GT50 has 2 point balance control.

BTW, I don't own the ST50, I own the GT50.

My friend with the ST50 calibrated the 2 point in the service menu and also got decent results with his gamma.

Thank you for your response, I was called away while writing the response when you posted.

I believe that you wouldn't comment suggesting calibrating a second mode, as you did earlier, if you couldn't get a satisfying result. What I really would like to know is if calibrated Cinema is as good or better than the options available on the GT50?

I think that in the service menu that you calibrate the color temps such as Warm 1 Warm 2 etc. then apply it to the viewing mode. I'm not certain on this so maybe someone with more knowledge than me can chime in.

I tend to wait for movies to come out on BD and then watch them in my HT with frame interpolation to smooth out the motion. Fortunately for me, these days, movies tend to be released on BD within about 6 months of their theatrical release.


Of the various implementations of frame interpolation I've seen, the best thus far has been Sony's implementation on the HX929 and VW95, but they're still not flawless/perfect. I'll have to go and check out the Panny's for myself to see how they fare.

I'm not too sure what display you have, but there are varying levels of frame interpolation. Consider it in this manner:

Film is shot in 24fps. If a display can refresh the images at say, a true 240Hz (fairly common for LCD's these days), then to play back the 24fps, the display can simply show each frame 10 times. This would retain the original/native 24 fps.

If you choose to enable frame interpolation though, you might be able to choose between say, Light, Medium, and Strong.

With the Light setting, instead of the original
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
the display now compares frames 1, 2 and 3 and creates new intermediate frames 1a between frames 1 and 2, frame 2a between 2 and 3 etc. and now it shows
1 1 1 1 1 1a 1a 1a 1a 1a 2 2 2 2 2 2a 2a 2a 2a 2a 3 3 3 3 3 3a 3a 3a 3a 3a...

At this setting, the display is only adding 1 additional created frame between the original frames.

With the Medium setting, it might now create:
1 1 1a 1a 1b 1b 1c 1c 1d 1d 2 2 2a 2a 2b 2b 2c 2c 2d 2d 3 3...
where it is now creating 4 frames for every original frame

With the Strong setting, it might now create:
1 1a 1b 1c 1d 1e 1f 1g 1h 1i 2 2a 2b 2c 2d 2e 2f 2g 2h 2i 3 3a 3b...
where the display is now creating 9 interpolated frames for every original frame.

Even 240Hz sets don't actually create 9 interpolated frames for every original frame but you get the general idea. The more interpolated frames, the greater the soap opera effect, as it emulates a much higher frame rate.

One of the reasons slightly older Sony LCD TVs were considered to have better creative frame interpolation than Samsung LCDs was due to the fact that at the lower settings, the interpolation was only enough to reduce 24fps stutter for most folks, but not high enough that they thought it looked too... soap opera like? The Samsung LCDs on the other hand, even at their lowest interpolation settings created enough frames to make it objectionable to folks who don't like the soap opera effect. That didn't really matter to me though, as I wanted the strongest interpolation available (i.e. the greatest number of created/interpolated frames for the highest apparent frame rate).

If I could find a display that could creatively interpolate to resemble 120Hz or higher without artifacts, I would get it. The problem is processing power. At this current time, no one does 'per-pixel' creative frame interpolation because it would use way too much processing power to do that in real time for 24 times 1920x1080 images per second. Because of this limiting factor, they use 'tricks' to decide what part of the image is important and concentrate the processing on keeping THAT in focus.

This is why you can occasionally see interpolation artifacts for instance, when a person or object like a vehicle moves across a complex textured field (bushes, chainlink fences, or anything with a busy pattern). You might have noticed a blurred 'halo' outline around the moving object as it passes the complex texture. With 'per-pixel' interpolation, they would map each pixel as opposed to mapping regions of pixels and we wouldn't have those artifacts.

Since it's a matter of increased processing power and/or better algorithms, it's only a matter of time.

When the Panny VT20 first came out, I asked Panasonic reps to include creative frame interpolation in future models. They originally said that creative frame interpolation isn't needed on plasma TV's because they inherently have better motion handling than LCDs and that frame interpolation was a crutch for LCD technology to try to improve motion handling. I then explained about 24 fps stutter and how some folks like me don't like it and after seeing frame interpolation on LCD sets, we want plasma picture quality with frame interpolation (and Samsung was implementing it). Glad the folks at Panny listened.


Max

Do you see the graininess on Sony TVs? Do you know where it comes from and/or why it happens. Up until now I had been a Sony junkie. Wouldn't by anything other than the best/latest XBR. However, from what I've been reading on reviews, they seem to have fallen behind... Just yesterday I saw a nice piece from Chad B on the HX929. However, still doesn't sound like the advantages outweigh the disadvantages and/or justify the additional cost. Would love to hear/read your views after checking out the Panny's.


Sony Grand Wega SXRD (RPTV), model number KDS-R60XBR1


What is the frame rate on over the air HDTV broadcasts at 720p and 1080i? Why don't we see SOE on those?


One of the reasons I am turning away from Sony and looking into Panny's (more than that actually - my VT50 arrives on Friday for pick-up at BB) is because I read, was told and though I saw (but I am doubting myself now) that motion in plasma sets did not have the dreaded SOE, and that with up to 600Hz (which is what some manufacturers advertise - new source of confusion for me: The VT50 can 'only' do 48Hz/60Hz/96Hz, but also has a 2500Hz "Focused Field Drive", which means what? and results in what real life benefit?), plasma also had the most natural motion (I guess you already clarified that what "seems natural" is the crap we've been brain washed and programmed for over years of movie watching since we were little kids. I'm now wondering if I made the right choice... any thoughts?

Thanks for the great post Max. Very appreciated!

HDTV broadcasts are 60Hz. Interlaced frames for 1080i and progressive for 720p. Some devices are better at the 3:2 conversion than others, but with all HDTV movie broadcasts, I see the 3:2 telecine pulldown judder, meaning the occasional, but regular hitching in motion. Most folks don't see it in fast motion (because the nature of 24fps drawbacks inherently cause motion blurring in fast movement). It's usually most obvious in pans, because it causes jerks in the smoothness of the panning. Obviously, anything that was natively shot in video at 60Hz will not show the 3:2 judder (sports, documentaries, TV shows and made for TV movies etc.).

The 600Hz is a gimmick used by the plasma manufacturers to counter LCDs increasing refresh rates. It simply describes the way the plasma phosphors are driven and has no real relation to LCD's 120Hz, 240Hz (and now 480Hz) ratings. The inherent problem with LCD technology is the refresh rate of the LCD pixels, going from full On to full Off, and LCD's are even slower going from gray to gray.

The reason why 3D LCDs tend to show more crosstalk/ghosting than 3D plasmas is because the LCD pixels are slower when changing from gray to gray. Meaning when the Left eye frame is shown, followed by the Right eye frame, any pixels that must transition from a darker shade to a lighter shade (or vice versa) between the different Left and Right eye frames haven't fully fully faded and transitioned fully to the new image, and the still fading 'afterimage' of the previous frame is still visible when the opposite eye of the active shutter glasses open. Therefore, you see a residue of the Left eye's image in the Right eye image and the difference in parallax between the images causes the visible shadowy 'ghost'.

The faster newer panels though (240Hz and now 480Hz) can switch from one image to another faster, so it reduces this crosstalk (the proper term for referring to one eye seeing a remnant of the image meant for the other eye).

The term 'ghosting' actually comes from prior to 3D and refers to the not-yet-faded afterimage on an LCD when there was fast movement. I noticed this very prominently in the old school (meaning almost a decade ago) LCD panels. In fast movement, for example, when I was watching The Lord Of The Rings: Fellowship Of The Ring on one of the older Panny LCD projectors. In the scene in the Mines Of Moria, after the group fights the enemies at Balin's tomb, they run through the darkened great halls of Moria. Because this scene is darker, requiring gray to gray transitions (slowest response with LCD pixels), as they ran past the pillars, I could distinctly see up to 4 stuttering shadowy afterimages of the pillars as they moved across the screen. Ghosts of the pillars that hadn't completely faded between the frames. I used to see this ghosting in the older LCD monitors too when friends were playing first person shooters, but the newer faster displays are much better at reducing/eliminating this ghosting.

The phosphors in plasma tech though, are still faster, so in fast movement (like in ice hockey for instance), the transition from one 60Hz frame to the next is faster, thereby reducing any potential display caused blurring (although plasma tech has some flaws too, like green trails due to the green phosphors not fading/turning off as quickly as the red and blue phosphors).

When they say that plasma has better motion resolution, they mean that for instance, in ice hockey, with players (and the puck) moving pretty fast, there is minimal blurring caused by the display, where older LCD panels would still show slight ghosting with the motion (that would lead to seeing a slightly blurry image at 60Hz, since the positions for a moving object from one frame to another is not as far apart at 60Hz as it would be at 24fps). I don't know if they eliminated the green trails from the XX50 plasmas, but the inherent clarity in fast motion is as good as or better than the best LCDs, even with frame interpolation turned Off on the plasmas, and now you have the option to turn it On for those who prefer the smoother soap opera look of a higher frame rate.

With many of the 240 and 480Hz LCDs these days though (especially with motion interpolation active), I don't have problems with motion blur and/or ghosting. The only problem is that as I've mentioned, motion interpolation tends to cause artifacts when a moving object moves past a complex textured background. The hardware and technology for motion interpolation has advanced fast enough and gotten powerful enough that it is now available in 3D where it wasn't even an option previously.

I wouldn't worry about ordering the VT50. Everything I've heard says it is one of the best sets currently available. I just need to check out how powerful the motion interpolation is for myself. I'd thought that the dual chip in the VT50 might be to implement a more powerful version of the motion interpolation. If it isn't worth the upgrade to me, then I'll just wait another year or two, since as I've said, with ever improved hardware and algorithms, the technology is seeing substantial improvements each generation.


Max

So, why don't we see SOE in sports, TV shows and made for TV movies natively shot in video at 60Hz (I assume this also means 60 fps video, right?)? What this tells me is that the problem that produces the SOE in human perception is not the higher frame rate, but actually the imperfect technology used to create interpolated images... I also don't see SOE on PS3/XBOX360 games or real (not CGI) in-game videos (which often run at 60 fps without need for pulldown or interpolation). Please let me know if I am making sense here and if there are any flaws in my logic. Just trying to wrap my head around this given that I hate SOE so much, but also dislike 24 fps judder.


What do you currently own?

Thanks for being so helpful. Really really appreciate it immensely!

What are these slides from D-Nice I keep reading about, how are they used, and where can I find them?

Thanks!

Found them!

You don't notice SOE in sports, documentaries and other shot on video stuff because you're EXPECTING them to look like that. It's all in your mind. You're so used to the fact that stuff like sports and other things are shot on video that you accept the way they look. Likewise we're all so used to the way film looks due to 24 fps that we expect THAT look when watching movies.

BTW, some made for TV movies AND shows/series are actually shot at 24fps to give it a higher budget film-like look. Isn't it sad when we're all so conditioned and brainwashed to expecting the look of those motion artifacts that producers/directors would LOWER the frame rate and therefore the picture and motion quality to make us believe it looks BETTER and more expensive?

I have a Sony HX929 and an NX810 in the bedroom. Had a HW30 and then a VW95 for a short while to assess and while the 95 is very good, I decided I wasn't completely happy with it and I'm waiting to see what shows up at CEDIA this year (so I'm currently projectorless).


Max

OK, don't want to sound defensive, but from what you just wrote I'm now almost certain that there is some other motion artifact (aside from what you are describing as SOE) that I see on LCD LEDs (Samsung, Vizio, have not seen it on Sony) that make the motion look like a bad documentary from the 70's. I know for a fact that I do not see this on over the air HD network channels running at 60Hz. I've only seen it on those LCD LEDs. This is not a condition of my brain. My RPTV does not do this. I am very perceptive on this stuff.

Is there another motion artifact that make video look like documentaries?

Cheers,
Spiffx

I'm not too sure what it is you might be noticing, but here's a simple demo of different frame rates and how they look:
http://www.engadget.com/2012/05/28/e...h-frame-rates/


Max

Thanks again Max. That 50fps video looks gorgeous to me. Watching this video doesn't bring the problem I see on the LCD LED Sammy (as well as Vizio and others) in motion flow. I was back at BB today, and watched the VT50, but the video playing there was too slow for any judgement (some cycling/BMX video). However, there was another, much smaller TV hanging high up on the wall, relatively far from where I was sitting, and my eyes where troubled by the motion on that set.

Anyway, thanks a lot for your help. The whole issue is much clearer to me now. I believe that the problem I see is bad implementation of image interpolation technology on LCD LED sets (perhaps it's related to LCDs with lower refresh rates ). As soon as D-Nice slides are through (in 4 days!) I'll pop-in some sci-fi BD and start enjoying my new Panny plasma. I hope I can enable the motion smoother and not be bothered by the motion effect.

Cheers,
Spiffx

I've been thinking of checking out the 96hz mode at a big electronics chain to see how I feel about it.
Can anyone walk me through how to change that settings? I'm not going to assume the people working there have a clue.

In order to switch to 96Hz, you need to feed the VT50 a 24Hz source. Not sure exactly where it is off my head, but it's somewhere in the picture menu and I think it's called '24p direct in'.

DoctorM, I think that means that the dealer will have to connect a Blu-ray player to the display, and you will need a movie that's been shot in 24p. That rules out almost all Blu-rays containing media originally intended for TV.