Night scenes in movies to dark

I have an LCD hdtv 32" RCA. Is there anyway you can lighten up scenes
that take place at night? I have tried the black expand thing, the color
and contrast. I have heard that LCD sets have this problem but hell
sometimes you can"t even tell whats going on it is so bad. Thanks in
advance for any info.

Bill

On Mon, 16 Jul 2007 18:46:48 -0400, (BILL) wrote:

I have an LCD hdtv 32" RCA. Is there anyway you can lighten up scenes
that take place at night? I have tried the black expand thing, the color
and contrast. I have heard that LCD sets have this problem but hell
sometimes you can"t even tell whats going on it is so bad. Thanks in
advance for any info.

Bill

That's where you want that huge contrast number. The bigger the
better.

Plus, a little more control over the brightness/contrast would be
nice.

But drop by the displays at your tv store when they have regular
broadcast tv and you will see that it is a common problem.

BILL wrote:
I have an LCD hdtv 32" RCA. Is there anyway you can lighten up scenes
that take place at night? I have tried the black expand thing, the color
and contrast. I have heard that LCD sets have this problem but hell
sometimes you can"t even tell whats going on it is so bad. Thanks in
advance for any info.

Bill

Low black levels have been a major weakness of LCD TVs. In the past
several years, the higher end models have made major strides in reducing
black crush and lowering the minimum black level, but this is still
trickling down to the lower end models. The LCDs still trail the plasmas
from Pioneer, Panasonic, and Samsung in this aspect. Does your RCA
screen look grey or whitish on black scenes? Does it look like it is
glowing when you are off axis for black backgrounds?

Probably not that much you can do about it without getting a new HD
TV, but you might want to try a calibration DVD such as "Digital Video
Essentials" which is $17 at amazon. The DVD is also useful for
calibrating your sound system. Won't totally fix your problem, but may
make it not as bad.

Alan F

On Mon, 16 Jul 2007 18:46:48 -0400, (BILL) wrote:

I have an LCD hdtv 32" RCA. Is there anyway you can lighten up scenes
that take place at night? I have tried the black expand thing, the color
and contrast. I have heard that LCD sets have this problem but hell
sometimes you can"t even tell whats going on it is so bad. Thanks in
advance for any info.

Bill

The Contrast control is sometimes called "White Level". Brightness is
sometimes called "Black Level". So if you've been adjusting the
Contrast control, you've been adjusting the wrong control.

If you're experiencing loss of detail in white areas, your contrast
is too high. If you have no details in black areas, your brightness
isnt high enough.

Try turning up the brightness and turning down the contrast.

-dickm

Try turning up the brightness and turning down the contrast.

-dickm

I went to a friends house that has a new Spectre Komodo 42" LCD flat
screen TV. He was showing it off to us, when I noticed the black was
way too black. I immediately went to the video menu and turned the
brightness up and tweaked the contrast. He had no idea how to do that.
They thought it was more "automatic". It was much improved IMHO.

dan

"BILL" wrote in message
...
I have an LCD hdtv 32" RCA. Is there anyway you can lighten up scenes
that take place at night? I have tried the black expand thing, the color
and contrast. I have heard that LCD sets have this problem but hell
sometimes you can"t even tell whats going on it is so bad. Thanks in
advance for any info.

Bill

I walked past a display of LCD sets at Circuit City recently, and was amazed
that there was no meaningful difference beween high end and low end set -
until. When they had a scene where half of the picture was in good light,
and the other half dark the low end sets showed no detail in the dark. The
Sony was best, followed by a Sharp, and some LG and some Samsung sets. The
other Samsung, and LG sets were as putrid as the Westinghouse and other
bargain brands.

Tam

On Mon, 16 Jul 2007 18:46:48 -0400, BILL wrote:

I have an LCD hdtv 32" RCA. Is there anyway you can lighten up scenes
that take place at night? I have tried the black expand thing, the color
and contrast. I have heard that LCD sets have this problem but hell
sometimes you can"t even tell whats going on it is so bad. Thanks in
advance for any info.

Adjust brightness and contrast to suit you. You may want to lower the
color if it's oversaturated. All the sets I've ever used put out way too
much color for my taste at default. Lowering the amount of color will
sharpen the image also.

--
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On Mon, 16 Jul 2007 20:09:00 -0400, Tam/WB2TT wrote:


"BILL" wrote in message
...
I have an LCD hdtv 32" RCA. Is there anyway you can lighten up scenes
that take place at night? I have tried the black expand thing, the color
and contrast. I have heard that LCD sets have this problem but hell
sometimes you can"t even tell whats going on it is so bad. Thanks in
advance for any info.

Bill

I walked past a display of LCD sets at Circuit City recently, and was amazed
that there was no meaningful difference beween high end and low end set -
until. When they had a scene where half of the picture was in good light,
and the other half dark the low end sets showed no detail in the dark. The
Sony was best, followed by a Sharp, and some LG and some Samsung sets. The
other Samsung, and LG sets were as putrid as the Westinghouse and other
bargain brands.

That's more adjustments than anything else. It wouldn't surprise me if
they adjusted them like that to sell the more expensive sets. They've been
doing this for years.

--
Want the ultimate in free OTA SD/HDTV Recorder? http://mythtv.org
http://mysettopbox.tv/knoppmyth.html Usenet alt.video.ptv.mythtv
My server http://wesnewell.no-ip.com/cpu.php
HD Tivo S3 compared http://wesnewell.no-ip.com/mythtivo.htm

"Wes Newell" wrote in message
news:[email protected]
On Mon, 16 Jul 2007 20:09:00 -0400, Tam/WB2TT wrote:


"BILL" wrote in message
...
I have an LCD hdtv 32" RCA. Is there anyway you can lighten up scenes
that take place at night? I have tried the black expand thing, the color
and contrast. I have heard that LCD sets have this problem but hell
sometimes you can"t even tell whats going on it is so bad. Thanks in
advance for any info.

Bill

I walked past a display of LCD sets at Circuit City recently, and was
amazed
that there was no meaningful difference beween high end and low end set -
until. When they had a scene where half of the picture was in good light,
and the other half dark the low end sets showed no detail in the dark.
The
Sony was best, followed by a Sharp, and some LG and some Samsung sets.
The
other Samsung, and LG sets were as putrid as the Westinghouse and other
bargain brands.

That's more adjustments than anything else. It wouldn't surprise me if
they adjusted them like that to sell the more expensive sets. They've been
doing this for years.

--
Want the ultimate in free OTA SD/HDTV Recorder? http://mythtv.org
http://mysettopbox.tv/knoppmyth.html Usenet alt.video.ptv.mythtv
My server http://wesnewell.no-ip.com/cpu.php
HD Tivo S3 compared http://wesnewell.no-ip.com/mythtivo.htm

The other thing is that some movies are simply shot that way. To me, the
Batman and Matrix movies, for instance, are too dark in a theatre. They
probably save money on set designs that way.

Tam

On Mon, 16 Jul 2007 18:40:17 -0500, dicko
wrote:

On Mon, 16 Jul 2007 18:46:48 -0400, (BILL) wrote:

I have an LCD hdtv 32" RCA. Is there anyway you can lighten up scenes
that take place at night? ...

Try turning up the brightness and turning down the contrast.


That's what I did, with my Sony LCD TV. I was watching the original
Star Wars and I noticed how the sand creatures' robes were pretty much
just a dark mass with no detail.

I turned the brightness up (and the contrast down) and I could
suddenly see the folds in the robes pretty clearly. I was now
watching a dusk scene rather than a night scene...

And I had less contrast! The picture was less striking.

I think it might be a trade-off, a decision each person makes: Would
you rather have a scene be a little more striking and visually
impressive, or would you rather see all sorts of details (that for all
I know the director didn't even intend you to see)?

I heard that Spielberg took a look at how his Jaws opening scene
looked on DVD, (perhpas on a TV with the brightness turned up?) and
said something like "I didn't realize we were making a porno movie."
For now, despite the director's original intentions, the viewer could
clearly see the naked body of the woman that had been hidden in
shadows in the theater.

My choice was simple: If I'm sure that a shot has a bunch of detail
that is being lost in a mass of black, I turn the brightness up (and
the contrast down, if needed).