92% Gamut Hype?

[Luthorcrow]

92% gamut or as Dell calls it "HC" seems to be the next big feature that every company is rushing to add to their mid and high end units. Now, as someone with a CRT itching to make the LCD jump at first this sounded like a really good thing. Another reason to park this 100lbs beast on the curve. But the more I read the more I am starting to wonder if this is a feature is being misrepresented to the customer. I am curious to see what others think and specifically to see if I am just misunderstanding the whole thing.

72% covers sRGB which pretty much the web standard as well as the display standard for most PC applications for viewing images. So if 72% gamut covers virtually all electronic image needs what is the big deal with 92% when only a few applications with color management i.g. Photoshop can even use it. Video cards don't support color management. So unless you are designing images for print, what is the big deal? Then I came across this article, The Great sRGB Versus Adobe RGB Debate

So who cares if a monitor supports a standard that isn't supported by almost any program/video card? As long as sRGB is the standard it seems like 92% or more should only matter to folks that need to print their images. On the other hand the only features that actually sound like they make a difference like 12-bit gamma correction or LUT (so color calibration would actual apply to something outside of Photoshop) are just too expensive or at least reserved for high end models only.

So have I missed something? What is the benefit of 92% if I am not printing images?

 

[Rembrandt]

High Definition video. That’s all I can think of.

 

[videomasterz]

some users say with the 3007-HC that there colors are much mroe vivid... but remember after color calibration the colors will seem dull again... but reading some articles about the 92% gamut... it would probably help for those graphic artists that need the extra colors to be visible on the screen..

 

[joemama]

No, you haven't missed anything and your post pretty much hits the nail on the head. For the average user a 92% gamut panel won't have a noticeable night and day difference when compared to a similar spec'd panel with 72%. Photographers and people who do graphic design for print will benefit the most..

 

[Rembrandt]

You can download pretty pictures that were made with a full Adobe Gamut range and stare at them for awhile. Isn’t that worth several hundred of dollars?

 

[videomasterz]

You can download pretty pictures that were made with a full Adobe Gamut range and stare at them for awhile. Isn’t that worth several hundred of dollars?

yup especially if it were pics of hot chicks

 

[Frychiko]

I've read that greens in particular are more lush. (customer opinions on a H-IPS 92% gamut 25.5" monitor)

 

[Luthorcrow]

You can download pretty pictures that were made with a full Adobe Gamut range and stare at them for awhile. Isn’t that worth several hundred of dollars?

LOL, but only if you are viewing them in Photoshop, Lightroom, ACD Pro or some other color managed program.

Ok, glade to see that I was right on that point. What made me realize it was I do a lot of graphics for the web and realized, wait a minute, my work flow is sRGB because anything else runs the risk of not looking right on the web in full RGB, so why do I actually need Adobe RGB?

On a side note, video cards should start supporting color management profiles.

 

[Luthorcrow]

I've read that greens in particular are more lush. (customer opinions on a H-IPS 92% gamut 25.5" monitor)

Is that in comparison to another equivalent IPS panel with 72% gamut or is that just the placebo talking?

 

[Godmachine]

Well there is a difference but really it doesnt serve the typical user of a LCD. Honestly any good current LCD with a 72 precent color gamut is just fine. Unless you do high end photo design. Either way this wouldn't make me buy a different monitor over my current one.

 

[j.shaftoe]

High Definition video. That’s all I can think of.

I realize I'm drifting off topic for which I apologize but the contributors seem to know what they are talking about and so I ask the question:

High gamut may not serve a useful purpose for the average pc user but in the case of HD television would high gamut LCD panels provide better color reproduction sufficient to improve the image quality and thus justify a premium price?

I will appreciate any thoughts on this.
Thank,

 

[Traveller]

On a side note, video cards should start supporting color management profiles.

What kind of support are you refering too? My Spyder 2 Express calibration tool "loads" the profile [icm] into the video card's LUT. I can actually see my Desktop change color during the loading step*.

*to be more exact, a warning message tells me it's time to recalibrate and when I click ok, the sw loads the profile.

 

[Rembrandt]

He must be talking about something else Traveller.

 

[Godmachine]

I realize I'm drifting off topic for which I apologize but the contributors seem to know what they are talking about and so I ask the question:

High gamut may not serve a useful purpose for the average pc user but in the case of HD television would high gamut LCD panels provide better color reproduction sufficient to improve the image quality and thus justify a premium price?

I will appreciate any thoughts on this.
Thank,

The average HDTV user still wouldn't notice a difference between 92 precent gamut and 72 precent. So no it wouldn't justify the premium price. Only a high end model with the highest resolution (1080p) and only with a good trained eye would you notice a real difference.

 

[Tamlin_WSGF]

So have I missed something? What is the benefit of 92% if I am not printing images?

Outside of coloraware applications, sRGB material gets "upscaled" to the larger aRGB color space. Its looking good. As long as I don't work with sRGB material, I have no need for my sRGB preset.

Considering also that even some elcheapo homeprinters and cameras can do aRGB, why limit yourself to sRGB then? sRGB pictures are "less accurate" towards the objective then the aRGB pictures, due to limited colorspace. Its also a bit futureproofing getting a widegamut screen, considering that more and more are moving over to aRGB.
link

Games look juicer too!

Only if your workflow is entirely based upon sRGB, it would be a waste of money to pay extra for widegamut.

 

[Luthorcrow]

Outside of coloraware applications, sRGB material gets "upscaled" to the larger aRGB color space. Its looking good. As long as I don't work with sRGB material, I have no need for my sRGB preset.

I could be wrong but I think you have that reversed. Adobe RGB (aRGB) or whatever none sRGB color space is used only in color aware programs but otherwise everything else is sRGB. So anything wider than that would be down sampled the result of which (see article in first post) would be that the colors will look unsaturated, dull, washed out. I did a few experiments with sRGB, aRGB and wide gamut RGB scans as viewed in Photoshop using each of those color spaces with all of the images on the screen. I also viewed them in normal desktop operations. It confirmed the following:

1) sRGB was the the what Windows uses (Windows Explorer, IE7, Firefox, etc).

2) Wide Gamut RGB looks absolutely washed out outside of PS. aRGB looks ok but still a little washed out.

3) Wide Gamut RGB does look better (contains more detail as seen in the alpha channels) when viewed in Wide Gamut RGB.

...why limit yourself to sRGB then? sRGB pictures are "less accurate" towards the objective then the aRGB pictures, due to limited colorspace. Its also a bit futureproofing getting a widegamut screen, considering that more and more are moving over to aRGB.

Games look juicer too!

Only if your workflow is entirely based upon sRGB, it would be a waste of money to pay extra for widegamut.

I am not worried about future proofing a LCD monitor because in all likelihood the sRGB standard is not going to change anytime soon and by the time it does hopefully OLED or whatever the new flavor is will actually be on our desktops.

The more I read the more it seems that games, HD video or nearly almost all electronic images are optimized for sRGB. If that is correct then all of this content would actually look worse on a monitor profiled to a wider gamut but because almost none of the programs, devices used actually use that wider gamut, you never see it. The irony being that if this feature was actually being used it would degrade your viewing experience not improve it.

I mean what are the real things that folks complain about: crushed blacks, banding; inaccurate grays, whites and blacks, etc. None of which is helped by a wider gamut.

Again, if I have missed the boat and someone with more knowledge, trust me I am no expert, can shed some light that would be rocking. But at this point, it looks like something that will matter in maybe ten years if media producers adopt one of the other color standards.

 

[venm11]

fwiw, the wide-gamut backlights have been available in LCD TVs for awhile now. There's a noticable difference between those that do and those that do not. For example, sony's XBR2/3 LCDs versus Samsung's LNS series- where deeply saturated colors appear on the screen (and only then) you will notice more color "pop" on sony's WGC-backlit TVs.

(on the other hand, they still don't compare to plasmas' color. Plasma technology Never talks about XXX% gamut)

 

[Rembrandt]

You are right on the money Luthorcrow. When I create a web page that has pictures on it, I want to have the pictures created using sRGB because of the potential that it will look very bad if I try to create it in Photoshop’s full color space. I can not afford to have a bad looking web site that will make the owner unhappy with me when he visits it the first time. I do not like unnecessary anger toward me or pages that I must redo to satisfy him. I do not have a singe customer that owns a monitor that uses a wide gamut monitor and probably none of their constituents.

On the other hand, I would like a wide color space monitor to view HD video. It really does make a difference in some movies not all of them, just some of them. I would see the difference but I do not think most would.

 

[Luthorcrow]

Rembrandt, thanks. Glad to know I am on the mark.

P.S. After a little more reading, I realize my test of wide gamut RGB was probably deceptive given that my CRT probably can't display beyond aRGB. If I remember right some of the colors in some of the wider RGB gamuts (greater than aRGB) are theoretical colors or beyond human perception.

fwiw, the wide-gamut backlights have been available in LCD TVs for awhile now. There's a noticable difference between those that do and those that do not. For example, sony's XBR2/3 LCDs versus Samsung's LNS series- where deeply saturated colors appear on the screen (and only then) you will notice more color "pop" on sony's WGC-backlit TVs.

(on the other hand, they still don't compare to plasmas' color. Plasma technology Never talks about XXX% gamut)

I would be curious to find something that is definitive on the color space for HD content. But given that it is not on all sets have this feature, it would seem that it would more likely not be supported yet.

I would bet those colors are popping more to over saturation, higher contrast and not due to a wider color space. Call me a cynic.

UPDATE:

sRGB is derivative of the HDTV color space standard (ITU-R BT.709-3). The primaries were matched so that majority of the color spectrum matches i.e. web content looks the same on a HDTV monitor as it does on your PC but the HDTV standard has a wider color gamut to accommodate the video content it was intended.

So if intended to use your monitor as a HDTV for Blueray, Xbox360, etc then it worth paying for the feature. If you are not going to do that, then it is an wasted feature.

HDTV (Rec. 709) is a good choice if you’re making a movie for high-definition television, and it’s also a good choice for motion-picture film work. This color space uses the same primaries as sRGB, but it has a larger gamut, so it makes a good working space for many kinds of work.

Source: Adobe Help Center

We are proposing the use of the color space, sRGB, that is consistent with but is a more tightly defined derivative of Rec. ITU-R BT.709 as the standard color space for the OS's and the Internet. In April of 1990 this space obtained unanimous worldwide agreement as the calibrated nonlinear RGB space for HDTV production and program exchange.

Source: http://www.w3.org/Graphics/Color/sRGB.html

The last one is pretty much definitive on this topic of HD as it relates to PC color space (sRGB).

 

[applebook]

So high quality 1080p content would actually make use of the 92%? I find this difficult to comprehend since even 30mbps and higher rate 1080p films still use images that are much smaller and lower quality than, say, a nice computer wallpaper in high-res.

 

[Tamlin_WSGF]

I could be wrong but I think you have that reversed. Adobe RGB (aRGB) or whatever none sRGB color space is used only in color aware programs but otherwise everything else is sRGB. So anything wider than that would be down sampled the result of which (see article in first post) would be that the colors will look unsaturated, dull, washed out.

I'm no expert, but this I know:

On a widegamut screen, everything will be upsampled outside of coloraware applications. Only on sRGB screens, aRGB material will look washed out.

I did a few experiments with sRGB, aRGB and wide gamut RGB scans as viewed in Photoshop using each of those color spaces with all of the images on the screen. I also viewed them in normal desktop operations. It confirmed the following:

1) sRGB was the the what Windows uses (Windows Explorer, IE7, Firefox, etc).

Many/most uses sRGB for their images because its the lowest common colorspace. BUT, how the content is displayed, depends on the monitor and its color profile, not IE itself. If IE would display material within a colorspace (like showing everything as sRGB) it would make IE coloraware, which it isn't.

2) Wide Gamut RGB looks absolutely washed out outside of PS. aRGB looks ok but still a little washed out.

Widegamut is not a fixed colorspace, aRGB is. How washed out it is, depends on how wide the gamut is. This is because colors are mapped outside of the gamut and doesn't get remapped. Convert a aRGB file into sRGB through photoshop, and you'll see what I mean about remapping.

3) Wide Gamut RGB does look better (contains more detail as seen in the alpha channels) when viewed in Wide Gamut RGB.

The amount of detail is the same. An 8-bit screen shows 16,7M colors/shades. The difference is how they are mapped within the gamut.

I am not worried about future proofing a LCD monitor because in all likelihood the sRGB standard is not going to change anytime soon and by the time it does hopefully OLED or whatever the new flavor is will actually be on our desktops.

Thats up to you. Already you can get cameras, printers and so on thats capable of capturing and printing colors deeper then sRGB. All the new technologies are capable of displaying deeper colors then sRGB. sRGB have been for decades already. Times shifts.

The more I read the more it seems that games, HD video or nearly almost all electronic images are optimized for sRGB. If that is correct then all of this content would actually look worse on a monitor profiled to a wider gamut but because almost none of the programs, devices used actually use that wider gamut, you never see it. The irony being that if this feature was actually being used it would degrade your viewing experience not improve it.

Its within the eye of the beholder. Some feel that dvd with upscaling capabilities improve the quality, while others might not for some purist reason.

I mean what are the real things that folks complain about: crushed blacks, banding; inaccurate grays, whites and blacks, etc. None of which is helped by a wider gamut.

Very true! For this, you need calibration control over color mapping and gamma curves.

Again, if I have missed the boat and someone with more knowledge, trust me I am no expert, can shed some light that would be rocking. But at this point, it looks like something that will matter in maybe ten years if media producers adopt one of the other color standards.

You are bringing up important questions which I am suprised not more are asking!

Color standards are limitations of color space or about defining boarders of a color space. Outside of coloraware applications, those boarders doesn't excist. This is because they cannot read the boarders, since they are not coloraware to put it simply. Output is therefore determined by the monitor and GFX LUT. Thats also why Traveller see changes in color when his Spyder profile chooser/LUT loader loads another profile into the GFX LUT.

 

[Tamlin_WSGF]

P.S. After a little more reading, I realize my test of wide gamut RGB was probably deceptive given that my CRT probably can't display beyond aRGB. If I remember right some of the colors in some of the wider RGB gamuts (greater than aRGB) are theoretical colors or beyond human perception.

Yes, its a bit flawed. Since you cannot see both colorspaces, you can't do a visual comparison. Both aRGB and sRGB are well within human perception. Here's the CIE chart which is defined after the spectrum the eye can see:

Here is some reading to understand the math behind the diagram.

 

[Luthorcrow]

I'm no expert, but this I know:

On a widegamut screen, everything will be upsampled outside of coloraware applications. Only on sRGB screens, aRGB material will look washed out.

Agreed on aRGB content looking washed out on sRGB settings. But you are wrong on your first point for two reasons. There is no reason for sRGB to be upsampled for widergamut screens (no I have a read that claim anywhere) because sRGB is a subset of the HDTV standard. Outside of coloraware programs everything on your PC is sRGB. Here is a little to test to prove it to you. Create/scan an image in aRGB color space. Then view it in Photoshop with the aRGB colorspace. Then view the same unmodified image in any other PC application (IE, Windows Explorer, etc). Everything other than PS will look terrible. If you did the same work flow with sRGB it would have looked fine in anything outside of PS set to another colorspace. A side note, sRGB is the default for PS. I am willing to beat most users have never changed it.

Many/most uses sRGB for their images because its the lowest common colorspace. BUT, how the content is displayed, depends on the monitor and its color profile, not IE itself. If IE would display material within a colorspace (like showing everything as sRGB) it would make IE coloraware, which it isn't.

Someone that understands how the standard was implemented could probably explain it better than I but IE and everything else on your desktop is not coloraware but it is limited to sRGB colorspace. If it were coloraware you could adjust it to another colorspace. And as we discussed prior, if you could, it would degrade your viewing experience because everything on your PC/web/PC games are sRGB.

Your color profile/calibration for you monitor will effect the accuracy of your colors. So yes its going to effect everything you view but that has nothing to do with whether you are viewing sRGB content. sRGB doesn't mean inaccurate colors.

Thats up to you. Already you can get cameras, printers and so on thats capable of capturing and printing colors deeper then sRGB. All the new technologies are capable of displaying deeper colors then sRGB. sRGB have been for decades already. Times shifts.

Did you know most portrait and wedding photographers shoot in sRGB and their entire workflow is sRGB. Most commercial print services only print in sRGB. For the most part the only folks printing in a higher color standard or folks on home printers, archivists and fine print photographers.

As for capabilities, I am just saying that outside of HDTV content it will not be used. Even there it is probably not being used as sRGB is more universal. So even most of that content is still sRGB.

You are bringing up important questions which I am suprised not more are asking!

So am I.

Color standards are limitations of color space or about defining boarders of a color space. Outside of coloraware applications, those boarders doesn't excist. This is because they cannot read the boarders, since they are not coloraware to put it simply. Output is therefore determined by the monitor and GFX LUT. Thats also why Traveller see changes in color when his Spyder profile chooser/LUT loader loads another profile into the GFX LUT.

Nope. It works the other way around. Outside of coloraware applicaitons the colorspace is limited to sRGB with the exception of HDTV and because sRGB is a subset of the color standard for HDTV as they were designed together to work together, you will likely never notice the difference. From what I have read most HDTV content is still in sRGB probably because it is the safe beat for now.

As for the color changing on a monitor after color calibration, that has nothing to do with the color space but how correct the colors are displayed on your monitor whatever the colorspace within physical limits of your monitor/content.

P.S. Good point on the alpha channels.

 

[Tamlin_WSGF]

Agreed on aRGB content looking washed out on sRGB settings. But you are wrong on your first point for two reasons. There is no reason for sRGB to be upsampled for widergamut screens (no I have a read that claim anywhere) because sRGB is a subset of the HDTV standard. Outside of coloraware programs everything on your PC is sRGB.

You'll see it in your link from W3.org. Windows uses a color management system with .ICC profiles. If your screen is calibrated and profiled to aRGB, it will show everything outside of coloraware applications as aRGB. Internet explorer are also bound by windows color management. When calibrated and profiled to aRGB, colors are mapped within a larger gamut and the values doesn't represent the same shade anymore. As example R (200) G (130) B (4) represents a different shade in the two color spaces.

Here is a little to test to prove it to you. Create/scan an image in aRGB color space. Then view it in Photoshop with the aRGB colorspace. Then view the same unmodified image in any other PC application (IE, Windows Explorer, etc). Everything other than PS will look terrible. If you did the same work flow with sRGB it would have looked fine in anything outside of PS set to another colorspace. A side note, sRGB is the default for PS. I am willing to beat most users have never changed it.

On an aRGB screen, this wouldn't be a problem. Photoshop would show it as aRGB and so would also IE. Here you have it graphically from the aRGB capable Eizo CG221:

cg221

Someone that understands how the standard was implemented could probably explain it better than I but IE and everything else on your desktop is not coloraware but it is limited to sRGB colorspace. If it were coloraware you could adjust it to another colorspace. And as we discussed prior, if you could, it would degrade your viewing experience because everything on your PC/web/PC games are sRGB.

It upgrades my experience. I am sitting infront of a NEC 2690WUXi, which is a widegamut screen. With the sRGB preset and my spyder2pro's profile chooser/LUT loader I can switch between sRGB and wide gamut while I write. It definitely look better in widegamut!

Your color profile/calibration for you monitor will effect the accuracy of your colors. So yes its going to effect everything you view but that has nothing to do with whether you are viewing sRGB content. sRGB doesn't mean inaccurate colors.

If you look at your first link in OP, then you'll see an illustration of the color mapping. red: 0-255 blue: 0-255 and green: 0-255 represents different shades in different colorspace. On a widegamut screen, the red/green/blue will be deeper values even though the numbers are the same. This is because they are mapped within a deeper gamut. Only through remapping into a smaller gamut like sRGB will the sRGB material be shown as sRGB. IE doesn't do that remapping.

Did you know most portrait and wedding photographers shoot in sRGB and their entire workflow is sRGB. Most commercial print services only print in sRGB. For the most part the only folks printing in a higher color standard or folks on home printers, archivists and fine print photographers.

This is true to some extent. Many commercial print services uses only sRGB (unless specially ordered) because its cheaper. Many photographers captures in aRGB first and then convert to sRGB upon need. Since its more possible now to have an entire workflow in RGB without relatively large investments, its prefered by many. Especially since many camera's now are capable of capturing the deeper RGB colors with 12-bit and some in 16-bit colors. Then they just convert to the smaller sRGB upon need.

As for capabilities, I am just saying that outside of HDTV content it will not be used. Even there it is probably not being used as sRGB is more universal. So even most of that content is still sRGB.


So am I.

It IS used outside of HDTV content. I'm 100% sure of that since I am sitting infront of a wide gamut screen with regular gamut CRT next to me.

Nope. It works the other way around. Outside of coloraware applicaitons the colorspace is limited to sRGB with the exception of HDTV and because sRGB is a subset of the color standard for HDTV as they were designed together to work together, you will likely never notice the difference. From what I have read most HDTV content is still in sRGB probably because it is the safe beat for now.

Look above.

As for the color changing on a monitor after color calibration, that has nothing to do with the color space but how correct the colors are displayed on your monitor whatever the colorspace within physical limits of your monitor/content.

P.S. Good point on the alpha channels.

Yes and no.
The calibrator reads colors first on machine and then read them on screen to make them match as accurate as possible. So far we agree. But, colorspace is a matter of limiting the material and screen to certain boundries. Colors change because they get remapped.

 

[Rembrandt]

Can we agree on this: The OS sets the default to sRGB with its own default profile. It is capable of rendering a much larger gamut than the default. With a specific profile that would be created it will reset the OS to show that wider gamut colorspace in all aspects and programs of the OS. Programs such as IE would then use the new colorspace.

 

[Luthorcrow]

Tamlin_WSGF, ok you definitely made the case for being able to override the OS icc setting with a calibrator and that was very useful info, thanks.

But you made two comments that don't seem to make sense to me they were:

It upgrades my experience. I am sitting infront of a NEC 2690WUXi, which is a widegamut screen. With the sRGB preset and my spyder2pro's profile chooser/LUT loader I can switch between sRGB and wide gamut while I write. It definitely look better in widegamut!

It IS used outside of HDTV content. I'm 100% sure of that since I am sitting infront of a wide gamut screen with regular gamut CRT next to me.

Assuming you are not talking about images that are beyond sRGB (PS images, digital camera photos) what content looks better? Maybe a movie on Blueray but what else? In my tests I found that viewing in the sRGB content in aRGB had the opposite effect of viewing aRGB in sRGB, that is the colors became exaggerated, over saturated particularly in the reds or at least that is how I would describe it rather than undersaturated, lifeless as aRGB does when viewed in sRGB.

 

[Rembrandt]

That does not make any sense to me Lithorcrow. The colors of sRGB are basically a subset of aRGB. sRGB’s full range encompasses within the range of aRGB. The pallet of aRGB would have all of the colors of sRGB and more. It would be capable of displaying the same identical colors of sRGB.

 

[Luthorcrow]

Duh. Back to the drawing board.

So it really should no effect then. Its times like this I need a 3007WFP and a3007 HC to sit side by side. To bad Dell doesn't love me.

 

[zzz]

I haven't read every post in detail, but here's my input:

There seems to be a question of whether a 92% gamut has any benefit for viewing web content, 1080p content, and most pictures. I say of course it does. Pictures and anything in the OS are restricted to a certain number of color bits, and regardless of that number, the "red-est red" or the "green-est green" will still look brighter and more vivid on a 92% gamut screen.

As an example, I made screenshots of Paint's color chooser and saved them as 4-bit and 8-bit bitmaps. As you can see, the gradient between the primary colors suffers, but the main colors are just as true as a 24-bit image. When I view those pictures on my 3007HC, the colors look far more vivid than a typical monitor, and that proves that content from any source will look different (and much better, in my opinion).

 

[bootstrap]

That does not make any sense to me Lithorcrow. The colors of sRGB are basically a subset of aRGB. sRGB’s full range encompasses within the range of aRGB. The pallet of aRGB would have all of the colors of sRGB and more. It would be capable of displaying the same identical colors of sRGB.

Are you talking about recalibrating an aRGB monitor to sRGB colors? Or are you saying that it could display all of the sRGB colors and the aRGB colors under a single calibration profile? I ask because the latter is only true if the aRGB monitor has a higher color depth -- otherwise, it has the same number of bits to spread out among a wider gamut, which means that the distance between colors gets further apart.

 

[Rembrandt]

I was just talking about how aRGB will show all of the colors of sRGB. You can infer that if you have a color profile set using an aRGB monitor in aRGB mode, you will receive all of the colorspace that is in sRGB. There will not be a loss of quality, viewing any item that was created in sRGB.

 

[applebook]

As an example, I made screenshots of Paint's color chooser and saved them as 4-bit and 8-bit bitmaps. As you can see, the gradient between the primary colors suffers, but the main colors are just as true as a 24-bit image. When I view those pictures on my 3007HC, the colors look far more vivid than a typical monitor, and that proves that content from any source will look different (and much better, in my opinion).

Well, of course the difference between 4 and 8 bit is noticeable because 4-bits is so low and will have terrible banding problems. The question is whether or not anything above 10-bits or even 8-bits is perceptible.

 

[Tamlin_WSGF]

Are you talking about recalibrating an aRGB monitor to sRGB colors? Or are you saying that it could display all of the sRGB colors and the aRGB colors under a single calibration profile? I ask because the latter is only true if the aRGB monitor has a higher color depth -- otherwise, it has the same number of bits to spread out among a wider gamut, which means that the distance between colors gets further apart.

Even with a different profile, there will be loss of shades, since the colors on an 8-bit aRGB monitor have colors/shades internally mapped outside of sRGB space. Thats why I have to use sRGB preset (on the screen) in addition to another calibration profile. I only have 16.7M colors to play with, so I want them all mapped within the colorspace I wish to use.

 

[Tamlin_WSGF]

Can we agree on this: The OS sets the default to sRGB with its own default profile. It is capable of rendering a much larger gamut than the default. With a specific profile that would be created it will reset the OS to show that wider gamut colorspace in all aspects and programs of the OS. Programs such as IE would then use the new colorspace.

I think we can agree upon that.

 

[Tamlin_WSGF]

Tamlin_WSGF, ok you definitely made the case for being able to override the OS icc setting with a calibrator and that was very useful info, thanks.

I'm no expert, but this what I have experienced myself and read to be true, so thanks.

Assuming you are not talking about images that are beyond sRGB (PS images, digital camera photos) what content looks better? Maybe a movie on Blueray but what else? In my tests I found that viewing in the sRGB content in aRGB had the opposite effect of viewing aRGB in sRGB, that is the colors became exaggerated, over saturated particularly in the reds or at least that is how I would describe it rather than undersaturated, lifeless as aRGB does when viewed in sRGB.

I'm talking about all material from games to movies. Everything looks better in widegamut. But, this is according to my taste and what I feel look better. Its hard to reproduce the same effect on a sRGB monitor. One can argue that the colors would seem more oversaturated, but since the whole image will be converted to aRGB upon viewing, the original sRGB material seems undersaturated if to do a side by side comparison with 2 screens.

 

[fuziwuzi]

i hardly understand half of what is being said here.

so basically if u get a 92% gamut monitor it will go to waste because half the apps don't use that high level of gamut

 

[Tamlin_WSGF]

i hardly understand half of what is being said here.

so basically if u get a 92% gamut monitor it will go to waste because half the apps don't use that high level of gamut

No, basically, if you get a 92% gamut monitor, all material outside of coloraware application will use the full 92% gamut. Green would look greener, red more red and blue more blue (in addition to deeper cyan, yellow and magneta)

 

[jacuzz1]

All this technical data makes a great deal of sense and yet, I can see a very real difference from my standard Dell 30. I am very pleased with my new HC. The colors just jump out at you and the contrast is right no the mark.

 

[Frychiko]

Maybe people who don't notice much difference, have calibrated their monitors to such a degree????

 

[Rembrandt]

To put things simply: Every program in your computer will work with the 92% Adobe spectrum except a few that have their own pre-set settings. The vast majority of those exception programs are photographic programs like Photoshop and most of those can be changed to use the wider spectrum also.