Question about Calibration I am attempting...

Originally Posted by jrodefeld

Hello everyone,

I have been in the process of calibrating my Pioneer Kuro PDP-5010FD for a while now. I am learning more about it as I go. I have the Digital Video Essentials: HD Basics bluray, the AVS disc (burned to a bluray). I have an Eye One Display 2 meter and am using ColorHCFR software.

I am trying to follow this guide:

http://www.curtpalme.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=10457


Now, after figuring out how to enter the service menu and adjust RGB controls, I have been able to calibrate the greyscale pretty good. From 20 IRE to 90 IRE patterns, the Delta E's are less than 3. 10 and 100 are slightly worse, around 4 or so. But from what I have read, that is a pretty darn good greyscale by any standard.

I have also adjusted the contrast and brightness correctly. I am using movie mode to calibrate.

Now, I have a couple of important questions.


1. Once I dial in the greyscale as accurately as I possibly can, I then am in a position to calibrate the color and tint. Now this is where I get a little bit confused. Now my display does not have a Color Management System.

So for the most part I am stuck with having to use the conventional Color and Tint controls. And from these, I have to get the color as accurate as I possibly can.

After the greyscale was dialed in correctly, I measured the primary and secondary colors with ColorHCFR. Now it appears that the colors are quite inaccurate.

I have been trying to get the primaries and secondaries as close as possible with the color and tint controls but I am having a hard time prioritizing. If I get red close to the target, it throws blue off by a lot. And so forth with green and the secondaries as well.

Unlike the greyscale calibration, I am unable to get all the colors closer to the ideal.


From what I understand, I should prioritize red due to skin tones.

I have been thinking that red and yellow should be closer to accurate due to the fact that accurate skin tones are a priority for a display.

I have also been thinking that green should be closer to accurate due to the prevalence of grass and plants and trees in so much footage. Reasonably accurate foliage and plant life would seem to be appreciated.

I have figured that blue could be "sacrificed" because inaccurate blue would seem to be the least likely to be obviously noticeable in most footage.


Does it seem like I am on the right track with my thinking?



I would really appreciate some help with getting the color as accurate as possible in a display without a Color Management System. Please note that I am using ColorHCFR.

Are there any tips and tricks to getting the most accurate colors? What priority should I place on the Primaries and Secondaries?


Now, much of the information out there on color decoding and calibration is incredibly complicated. I would prefer if you could give some advice that is geared more towards a relatively simple method that certain calibrators use to calibrate color in displays that lack a CMS.

I know many of you have calibrated the Pioneer Kuros. For the non-Elites, how have you been able to get the color as accurate as possible?

I really hope I can get some feedback from the experts here.



Leave the color and tint at their default center postilion.
These setting are normally very close to as good as it get in this type of situation.
If the set has Red Green and Blue filter mode then use the color bar pattern on the calibration disk with the TVs Blue Filter on.

There are 2 reasons I say this. First off you meter is not accurate enough without being profiled against a Spectro to do color work. Second you can not do anything without a CSM or external video processor other than raise and lower the brightness (color control) of ALL colors at once or remove/add blue Tint control.





2. I know color calibration "builds" on greyscale calibration. To measure the colors I am displaying 100% intensity primary and secondary color patterns.

Are my readings in any way dependent on how accurate the 100% greyscale pattern is? Because exactly at 100% grey (or white), I allowed for a higher delta E than other points. Going off the guide, it was suggested that errors that high are more unlikely to be seen in normal programming than in the middle or the bottom of the greyscale.

Does this affect the accuracy of 100% saturation primary color readings?


Yes, 100% white is expected to be correct and is used when doing gamut work.

3. I set my Pioneer color temp setting to "low" to do the grayscale calibration. Initially I tried to start with "mid" as the setting, but I found out that I could get a significantly more linear and flat grayscale starting from the "low" setting.

But do you think "mid" would give more accurate Primary and Secondary readings?


Or if I tried a different picture mode? I am already using "movie", which if I understand correctly, should give the most accurate colors already. Is it unlikely that User or another mode would give better colors?

[color="Red"]No the gray scale needs to be correct so the color laid on top will be correct. Primaries are where they are and without a CSM can not be moved. Color is very complicated and how your set works with color is mind blowing.. you are measuring those colors at one tiny spot 100%. I do not understand it well enough to put into words but I have learned that center defaults works best 99% of the time on a digital set. I promise you if your set was measured with a more accurate meter, your primaries would be in a different location..
[COLOR]

4. Do adjusting the color and tint controls throw off the greyscale? As I go through adjusting those controls, should I expect to have to go back and "touch up" the greyscale in the service menu?
No, if the controls "Work Correctly" Color and tint will not change the gray scale.
Gray scale is the adjustment of the luminous signal, color and tint adjust chroma part of the signal (google video signal http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chrominance)


Thank you so much for all the help I have received so far in this forum. I hope some experts here are able to answer my question. I appreciate the grayscale being more accurate, but a primary reason for me wanting to calibrate my tv is get better and more accurate colors. The greyscale calibration was fairly straightforward, but getting accurate colors from my limited color controls seems much less simple.

Please help me.