It's official. I see a rainbow-like effect on every plasma. - Page 5

Mr. Wiggles, you seem to know what I'm talking about. I thought I heard it described as phosphor decay somewhere but wasn't sure. Yes I do see it sometimes on my 46" Sony RPTV but it's not nearly as bad as I've seen it on the plasmas.

Do you know of any Plasma displays that do not have phosphor decay? This would help me out. I think I heard somewhere that Samsung PDPs don't have it. Can you confirm?

All phosphors have a decay time. I have no idea as to what plasmas might use different phosphors (I'm not that familiar with plasmas specifically at all), so I'm sorry I can't help you there.

Take a look at different manufacturers, the effect is greater on some and less on others. To me, Pioneer and Panasonic have the worst trails, and samsung has the least noticable - go figure.

Doug

I guess I'll look into the new samsungs coming out then. Thanks mate.

Forgive me if I use incorrect terms and such... but this is all new to me. Here is my story.

I'm in a fairly bright room so I thought the best solution would be a LCD. I bought the Sony Bravia 40" LCD a few weeks ago and set it up at home. What started to worry me while watching was a combination of tunnel vision and pixel lag. It seemed like where I was watching the screen and about 10 inches around that looked great... but outside of that, my brain was "telling" me that things were blurry... thus giving me a tunnel vision effect. I was used to it though. But then I'd hit a scene in a movie where I WANTED to see the whole screen and I could not... a fly by over the battle at the beginning of Fellowship of the Ring was a complete blur to me...

But I tried... found I could get it better once I bought the new Toshiba HD DVD player and pushed the 1080 resolution at the TV... things got better.

But then I started to hate how the dark areas of a movie would just be too dark, but the bright areas too bright. Trust me... I played with the settings for two weeks solid and could not get a good balance.

So I went plasma and bought the new Panasonic 60U... this thing makes a GREAT picture... answered all my dreams... until I was FLASHED with green during a high contrast shift in the image... I could also see green trails behind fast moving objects.

Was hard for me to notice in the store (but when I return now... I can see them).

The final proof was putting Casablanca in the DVD player... nice sharp picture... and TONS of color. Looked like bright jellyfish darting all over my screen teasing me.

My wife says the TV looks fine to her (have not had the chance to show her B&W yet).

ANYONE have any info that might help me out here? Went to the store again and confirmed that Plasma has the best picture... but these flashes are going to drive me crazy I'm afraid.

I seem to be one of the cursed minority.

Solutions?

dalandis

Sadly, you may be one of those rare individuals that are so susceptible to artifacts that no display may be watchable for you. Seriously, some people react very atypically to visual phenomena that most don't notice. Here's a thread from another forum in which someone describes not being able to view HDTV because of motion sickness:

http://www.dbstalk.com/showthread.php?t=57614

Take it out of Vivid

dalandis: Some people watch other people making shadow picures on the wall by holding their hands in front of a lamp.

If you can see rainbows there I sure would like to be smokin' whatever you are smokin'!

Okay... thanks everyone for the jokes. I'm not an idiot or smoking anything though. I fear what SillySam is telling me.

I agree that it's completely messed up. But it's there for me.

Like if I change the aspect ratio and those gray bars come up flanking the screen... I see rainbow-type flashes in that gray.

The grayscale Casablanca is a killer on me.

All the while, my wife is standing right next to me saying that she sees nothing of the sort.

I also went to a local HomeMedia store and sat in their pro room... looking at a Pioneer Pro profesionally tweaked out... thought there was nothing... but then they changed the channel to a movie of the Addams Family and SCREAMING rainbows showed up in people's white shirts.

It is such a shame, because I put in Robots last night (the movie I viewed as the HARDEST to make look good on LCD) and it looked AMAZING... I saw things on the screen - details that I never knew were there.

The movie was completly watchable (seeing flashes only in the most extreme cases - like where the little dishwasher bot is trying to fly with Rodney in the sky/clouds).

But then KONG had lots of flashes... Ice Age had quite a few... When the Ice Age credits come up I cringe with strain as rainbows dance inside the white text.

AND YES... I'm out of vivid mode. I played with the settings extensively.

Is there some secret service menu that has a magic setting that will fix this? That would be a dream come true!

(Heck... I can even see the rainbows when looking at the screen with sunglasses)

I also see those short green trails on ultra fast high contrast movement... but those I could live with. This other effect sort of attacks your eyes... especially if I turn my head while watching (the whole screen can then display a green flash in my eyes.)

Looking like a dead dream for me... unless they can get those LCDs in shape with better refresh and clarity.

But I guess I'll be met with more jokes.

Just count yourself lucky that you don't see what I see.

dalandis

please keep us posted if someone finds a way to lessen the rainbow effect. Should something be adjusted in the main settings area, i.e. contrast? brightness? color? tint? sharpness? or color temperature?

dalandis. Try the new Samsung plasma's. I have been told by a few people that the rainbows and trails are not present on these.

Artwood, stop being an idiot. You come on this tread and all you do is make fun of people. We have proven throughout this thread that rainbows and trails do exist on plasmas. They are caused by phosphor decay. Most people don't see them and I guess your one of them, but if you have nothing intelligent to contribute then leave this thread.

okay conan48... I'll take a look at those.

wish I could see it easier in the stores... but their feeds usually hide it pretty well for me.

will take a look on my lunch

I never liked the picture quality of Sony Bravias. Sure, they have a really good viewing angle, but that is about it. The thing that bothered me most when viewing them at Best Buy is how strong the contrast is. As you described, the blacks and white appear crushed and unrealistic.

My Westinghouse 32w6 on the other hand gives me an image that appears to have much more natural lighting. Great contrast, but nothing is crushed. Maybe you should check out the 42w1 and see how that looks to you?

Conan48: ran by best buy to check out the samsung... but had to leave pretty quickly and did not have time to confirm... but I thought I saw green flash on that too (but the green tracers did seem to be less)... but the flashes is what I cannot live with. Again, hard to tell in the store... need to find a store that will let me play with a remote.

justinluck: did not see your post before I left... so will look into the Westinghouse as well. With LCD, I wish I could demo ROBOTS on one... the entire opening sequence of that movie played havoc with the Sony... a looooonng really slow pan with tons of details to see... (but could not see any of the details) (on the other hand, when I saw that same section on plasma last night the difference was night and day... plasma dominated)

I assume all that has to do with refresh rates? Hard to find like some master comparison sheet of refresh rates... and will the new 1080 LCDs handle this better?

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dalandis

Rainbows, flashes, moire, smearing, judder. It would be helpful to know precisely what it is you are perceiving. I see judder and moire quite often and smearing under certain conditions on my plasma. But from what I understand about the way AC-type plasmas operate, I don't see how rainbows could be produced unless it's embedded in the source material somehow. Perhaps your "persistence of vision" isn't as "persistent" as we common Joe's and you're getting distracted by judder and smearing?

Have you sampled the 72 Hz-capable Pioneer Elites (running at 72 Hz, natch)?

Probably the best example of the worst case scenario (and the effect that causes the most concern that I have to retreat from plasma) is this sort of intense color flashing. For instance, if I change the ration to 4:3 and it puts up those gray bars... those gray bars are not flat gray color to me... they sort of radiate pulses of colors as my eyes move over the image. (Same thing happens over the whole screen if I watch black and white movie like Casablanca). It becomes less noticable when watching something like Robots... I could live with that... but when it does hit me, it sort of hurts... and when watching SD or HD it is much worse. Now that I know that this happens, when I am in Best Buy and walking down the plasma row... if I turn my head fairly fast I see a BRIGHT GREEN spear jab at my eyes from all the plasmas. (Also, if I wave my hand in front of the screen my eyes see lots of rainbow colors between my fingers - not that I watch TV that way... but I've seen others that complain about this issue to describe the same trick.)

Perhaps I am a cylon?

Now... your comment about 72 Hz Pioneer Elites... I think I saw one of those units at a local HomeMedia (but don't know if it was running at 72 Hz)... are you suggesting that the 72 Hz is a pulse rate (sorry if my terms are idiotic) that is similar to CRT? Would that be the standard setting for that unit?

I've been wondering in this process if somehow my CRT watching all day (graphic designer on a LACIE CRT) has trained my eye to a certain pulse... and the plasma uses a different one... and my eyes keep snatching at the pulses? Is this even possible? The reason I wonder that is it felt (but perhaps phantom feelings) that when I return to work after massive testing sessions on the plasma, that I see YELLOW screaking on my CRT... something that has NEVER bothered me in 15 years of working on a CRT. CRTs have never been a strain for me... computer LCDs never seemed as good to me as my CRT. (laptop LCDs actually seem to hurt my eyes)

What do you think 1920x1080? Does this provide any clues? Again... can't be the TV because my wife stands next to me saying that she cannot see them.

Does the Panasonic 60U have a service menu that might contain a setting that would help me?

Please folks, stop doubting the existence of this issue, I have previously explained that it has to do with the different phosphor-decay rates. You can see this effect on some CRTs as well, and yes it is similar to the rainbow effect on DLP, but it is yellowish-green in color, not a full RGB color separation rainbow.

It is not in the source, it is not judder or anything like that. If you pause a high-contrast black and white image, and then dash your eyes around, you will be most likely to see this artifact. The paused image is case in point that this is a temporal artifact of the display, and not related whatsoever to the source content.

I don't doubt it... I definitely see that the green decays slower than the rest when things are moving fast (but this is not a bother to me) I remember seeing a post of a Sin City screen shot here at avs that showed that effect.

But does this same artifact create these pulses? I can understand that might be it... but why the heck do I have to see it so MUCH! Mostly green... but I also see red and blue in there sometimes. So to me... I see different decay rates for all three colors. So when the red and blue drop out, I'm left with a green pulse around that area of contrast.

Yes, it's made worse as well by the PDM/PWM nature of plasma displays.

So according to the info from ChrisWiggles... this ability to see decay with my eyes much more sensitive than 99% of the population? Thus meaning that plasma is a TV I cannot watch? Could it be the fact that the TV has less than 100 hours of operation? (but then I see this stuff in showrooms too... and they certainly have run for more than 100 hours - so that does not seem to hold up) Any special lenses I could wear to help? Wow... this stinks. Plasma is SO much better than LCD to me. Any future technologies that might help this?

dalandis, I have the same tv as you. what are your settings at:

STANDARD/VIVID/CINEMA?
PICTURE?
BRIGHTNESS?
COLOR?
TINT?
SHARPNESS?
COLR TEMP?
BLACK LEVEL?


Want to compare, mine are:
STANDARD
PICTURE: +12
BRIGHTNESS: +5
COLOR: -2
TINT: -5
SHARPNESS: -3
COLR TEMP: Warm
BLACK LEVEL: Light

Thanks for the specs... I'll certainly test them tonight... but I'm not hopefull. Your settins look similar to things I've tried... (heck, I've pulled the picture and/or brightness all over the place... I can definitely make the process worse). But to try to get rid of it also makes the picture into mush. (I'll let you know.)

But wait Chris Wiggles... the only thing that does not jive is let's say I'm wathing the end credits of ICE AGE... if it was JUST pixel decay, wouldn't I just see color trails? What I see is almost like a rainbow glowing within the white lettering. While at lunch today, I was walking BEHIND the plasmas and could see that Ambient light tv... it has color tubes back there to splash colors on the wall that correspond to the screen image... looking at those tubes - exposed was the closest thing I have seen that compares to what I feel during these pulses of contrast change.

Thoughts?

No, it's not color trails I'm talking about, I'm talking about temporal rainbows. Pause the image, and look at it with your eyes fixed. It should just appear normal. Now move your eyes quickly, you see colors now? That's rainbows and yes you can get those on plasmas.

Well ChrisWiggles, I can definitely say that I've seen that. And it's sharp and painful to me. But it seems I don't have to move my eyes much at all. Perhaps when those sidbars are up it is most noticable because my eyes drift over the image in the middle and I am flanked with colors that show up in those gray bars. That's the easy way to make myself see them.

I'll mess with settings some more tonight.

So am I out of luck with plasma (and DLP too I assume)?

I'm surprised I'm not more sensitive to CRT? Isn't that the same deal?

If so what are the votes on the best LCD? I was not happy with 40" Sony Bravia at all.

Who knows--maybe you have an inherrited gene that causes you to see rainbows on everything but a Sharp Flat Panel LCD!

IF you do then this will get my vote for the greatest Company or technology Plant post of all time!

Seriously though--if you don't like Flat Panel LCD either--what will you do--quit watching TV or buy a Rear Projection CRT?!

I would think that if your eyes are that sensitive, then watching TV on CRTs would be intolerable. I know that when I go to Best Buy and walk down the aisles of CRTs, I start to become nautious from the constant flickering in my peripheral vision. Even when I look directly at an HDTV CRT, the image doesn't appear as stable as on an LCD. What is the refresh rate set at on your computer monitor?

They say people see a lot of rainbows in the Bay area.

As long as you don't vomit in Best Buy. Are you sure it just isn't the store? Does it happen at Circuit City?