Spears & Munsil 4K UHD HDR Benchmark (Test Discs) May 15, 2023

[Wendell R. Breland]

Originally Posted by Stacey Spears

Thank you, we greatly appreciate it!

Have not found much definitive information, Dolby says the max rate for Atmos is 24.5 Mbps, info from here. They have a profile specification that you have to sign up for, here. Atmos is covered by SMPTE ST 2098-2:2019, Immersive Audio Bitstream Specification.

I am retired and no longer a member of SMPTE. Sorry I could not find more info.

BTW, really enjoyed you long post above, a big

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by p5browne

For the non DIYers out there.
HDMI settings for your set, are a different set of settings, than from those used by the USB inputs. Just to confuse things more, the underlying settings are the SDR settings. Not playing a video - SDR settings. Playing a video is required, in order for the settings, for what ever parameter you're using. (HDR, DV, USB, HDMI, etc) for installing, changing or reading. (Else wise if changing settings, and no video playing, you'll mess up the SDR settings)

Or you could just play the USB file through your primary disc spinner and thus use all the same settings and pathways. Though it depends if the player is any good at files, as the Panasonics are shite, the Sonys are better and the OPPOs are the kings.

[p5browne]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

Or you could just play the USB file through your primary disc spinner and thus use all the same settings and pathways. Though it depends if the player is any good at files, as the Panasonics are shite, the Sonys are better and the OPPOs are the kings.

As long as the BD player isn't messing with the USB input/output signal in any way.
How to prove it. That's another story.

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by p5browne

As long as the BD player isn't messing with the USB input/output signal in any way.
How to prove it. That's another story.

That's why there are test patterns

[p5browne]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

That's why there are test patterns

I know they're test patterns, I'm just saying does signal in equal signal out, or does the player somewhat corrupt the pattern signal ?

[Stacey Spears]

Originally Posted by Wendell R. Breland

Have not found much definitive information, Dolby says the max rate for Atmos is 24.5 Mbps, info from here. They have a profile specification that you have to sign up for, here. Atmos is covered by SMPTE ST 2098-2:2019, Immersive Audio Bitstream Specification.

I am retired and no longer a member of SMPTE. Sorry I could not find more info.

BTW, really enjoyed you long post above, a big

The 24.5 number, if true, makes me breath a sigh of relief. That means no matter how dynamic it is, I should be safe. Thank you for looking into this for me, it helps out greatly.

[Stacey Spears]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

Or you could just play the USB file through your primary disc spinner and thus use all the same settings and pathways. Though it depends if the player is any good at files, as the Panasonics are shite, the Sonys are better and the OPPOs are the kings.

What I have found is that every new source I play, be it USB SDR, HDR, DV, streaming (even between Netflix, Amazon, etc.. and SDR, HDR10 and DV), etc.. I have to double check my picture settings once it starts to make sure things are correct.

e.g. Even if I use the copy to all inputs on the LG for my cinema mode, not everything is applied. I still have to turn off NR, detail, frame rate stuff at least once for each.

Also, over the weekend I found a difference between pattern on disc in OPPO vs. USB input on OPPO. One pixel is cropped on the left via disc while none via USB.

For DV, using the same color space eval pattern, I see three different results. One disc, USB through same player and USB directly into TV. This was mostly around the chroma resolution bursts. TV vs. player I can understand, different decoders with different chroma upsampling algorithms and possibly alignment issues. I was more surprised on the player.

The LG and OPPO file browsing for USB are my favorites. Panasonic is okay on the player. Sony, on their TV, is the worst. This is subjective. I don't like how they remove the folder structure and put all the content together. I sort by folders to organize the content. Or even testing different versions.

One of them will show the full file name at the bottom or top of the screen and it shortened in the list. I think it is OPPO. I like this. On the LG, I have to highlight and then wait for it to scroll to see the full name. I often put version differences at the end and that is what I am looking for.

[Geoff D]

I use several players so I always double check my TV settings when I switch to whatever deck, yep. I use different picture presets between HDR and SDR and of course Dolby is its own thing too, so again double checking is just a natural thing that I do now. Once that's done then differences between what each deck plays over disc and USB may well have tiny variations, but at least the actual TV settings are identical. And, ironically enough given the protestations about USB, it's the USB playback on the OPPO that has the pixel perfect representation while the disc playback is missing a pixel. Heh.

And yes, Sony TVs are a PITA for file playback, that layout is so bad.

[Wendell R. Breland]

Originally Posted by Stacey Spears

The 24.5 number, if true, makes me breath a sigh of relief.

For one more reference, the 2015 Dolby Atmos Blu-ray demo disc. Watched the following trailers and movie clip:

Amaze ● Atmosphere ● Shattered and Unbroken (movie clip)

Again using the Oppo the Atmos data rates varied between about 4 to 8 Mbps, never saw it go above 10 Mbps for these sources.

A lot of these clips are available at Demo World (which will close 6/5/2020).

[Oniiz86]

Originally Posted by Stacey Spears

Also, over the weekend I found a difference between pattern on disc in OPPO vs. USB input on OPPO. One pixel is cropped on the left via disc while none via USB.

Strange that OPPO is not quite pixel perfect via disc playback but is with USB, you would think the opposite as they were thought of offering reference video level playback with discs, so Chroma Alignment issues & a sole pixel missing for some odd reason, their engineers weren't quite the pixel peepers after all.

[Stacey Spears]

Originally Posted by Oniiz86

Strange that OPPO is not quite pixel perfect via disc playback but is with USB, you would think the opposite as they were thought of offering reference video level playback with discs, so Chroma Alignment issues & a sole pixel missing for some odd reason, their engineers weren't quite the pixel peepers after all.

They did not have these patterns during the development of their player. By the time we shipped our disc, they had stopped making players. If they were still making players, I am confident they would be fixed. They were great about that.

In fact, when we made our very first disc. They told us don't worry about making their player look good. Any issues our patterns find, they will fix. And they fixed an issue I did not think could be fixed before their very first BD player shipped. They were a great company!

[Oniiz86]

Originally Posted by Stacey Spears

They did not have these patterns during the development of their player. By the time we shipped our disc, they had stopped making players. If they were still making players, I am confident they would be fixed. They were great about that.

In fact, when we made our very first disc. They told us don't worry about making their player look good. Any issues our patterns find, they will fix. And they fixed an issue I did not think could be fixed before their very first BD player shipped. They were a great company!

Understandable but curious all the same that usb playback is unaffected isn't it via the MediaTek SoC chipset? I suppose it's not worth your time to pass on this information to OPPO's engineers, I know wishful thinking at this point in time but they may surprise us with a final bug fixing update.

[Stacey Spears]

Originally Posted by Oniiz86

Understandable but curious all the same that usb playback is unaffected isn't it via the MediaTek SoC chipset? I suppose it's not worth your time to pass on this information to OPPO's engineers, I know wishful thinking at this point in time but they may surprise us with a final bug fixing update.

I sent them a list of issues I found with the disc last year.

[Oniiz86]

Originally Posted by Stacey Spears

I sent them a list of issues I found with the disc last year.

Yes I know but i just figured that you could pass on the newly discovered "image cropping" bug that has come to light with the new disc that you'll be releasing later this year.

[Stacey Spears]

Originally Posted by Oniiz86

Yes I know but i just figured that you could pass on the newly discovered "image cropping" bug that has come to light with the new disc that you'll be releasing later this year.

Email sent. But to be clear, you can see it on the current disc.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Stacey Spears

One key point I want to make is that no LUTs were used for the grade. LUTs are incredibly popular and used by many, but a LUT has finite precision. Nothing beats a real mathematical transforms and hand grading. The problem is speed. The turn around time using a LUT is much faster and they can pre-create a look and apply it to everything and save so much time. Not to mention there are people like Phil Holland who have spent countless hours building amazing LUT packs based on their years of experience, that allows a novice produce YouTube content that rivals a feature film.

I highly doubt it was your post, but somebody/something catalyzed this rant from a couple days ago with regards to LUTs – http://www.rockflowers.net/luts-are-just-stupid-tables/

P.S.
Perhaps? it was Frame.io Insider -
https://blog.frame.io/2020/04/27/luts-vs-transforms/

[Sledgehamma]

Originally Posted by Stacey Spears

...
Also, over the weekend I found a difference between pattern on disc in OPPO vs. USB input on OPPO. One pixel is cropped on the left via disc while none via USB.
..

Those players usually use a different playback engine for full disc playback vs. single file playback. Thats most likely the cause of the issue.

[Oscarilbo]

Excuse me if this has been brought so many times, but given the opportunity we have with the HDR settings of the panasonic players (9000, 820, and 420) which are the patterns I should look for in order to get the best viewing from my HDR projector? I’m talking about the sliders under the HDR optimizer... Dynamic Range, White Tone Curve and Balck Tone Curve...I’m interested in great contrast and shadow and highlight details. I ask this because I was under the impression we shouldn’t move HDR settings in a display such a projector, but the Panasonic player changes that, doesn’t it?

[Stacey Spears]

Originally Posted by Oscarilbo

Excuse me if this has been brought so many times, but given the opportunity we have with the HDR settings of the panasonic players (9000, 820, and 420) which are the patterns I should look for in order to get the best viewing from my HDR projector? I’m talking about the sliders under the HDR optimizer... Dynamic Range, White Tone Curve and Balck Tone Curve...I’m interested in great contrast and shadow and highlight details. I ask this because I was under the impression we shouldn’t move HDR settings in a display such a projector, but the Panasonic player changes that, doesn’t it?

If you are talking about our recommendation on not touching picture controls, that relates to the basics like brightness, contrast, color and tint, etc...

The HDR specific controls are about tone mapping. My advice would be to test 1000 and 4000 nits since those are the two most common peak luminance values that are targeted today. Since these only apply to HDR10, I would focus on 1000, which is the disc default.

Here are some measurements of what HDR Optimizer does. I only tested a few settings as well as different display type outputs to see what happens. When I test it, I normally leave the various controls at default and just turn on and off when set to OLED since I have it hooked up to a C9 most of the time.

Which projector are you using?

Now we recently made an interesting discovery. I don't recall which projector my co-worker has, but when playing DV files (profile 7 mp4) from the USB input, it outputs DVLL. The display does not support DV, so probably a player bug. On disc, it plays HDR10. Interesting discovery none-the-less.

[Oscarilbo]

Originally Posted by Stacey Spears

If you are talking about our recommendation on not touching picture controls, that relates to the basics like brightness, contrast, color and tint, etc...

The HDR specific controls are about tone mapping. My advice would be to test 1000 and 4000 nits since those are the two most common peak luminance values that are targeted today. Since these only apply to HDR10, I would focus on 1000, which is the disc default.

Here are some measurements of what HDR Optimizer does. I only tested a few settings as well as different display type outputs to see what happens. When I test it, I normally leave the various controls at default and just turn on and off when set to OLED since I have it hooked up to a C9 most of the time.

Which projector are you using?

Now we recently made an interesting discovery. I don't recall which projector my co-worker has, but when playing DV files (profile 7 mp4) from the USB input, it outputs DVLL. The display does not support DV, so probably a player bug. On disc, it plays HDR10. Interesting discovery none-the-less.

Thank you Spears... Interesting. Yeah, those basic display controls is what I understood it would be better to leave untouched. My projector is a 2000 lumens 4K HDR BenQ HT2550M, which I recall you once said you hadn’t had experience with those. Love what the optimizer does but I think it could have a bit more perceived contrast, but I also want a natural looking picture. I have the calibration UHD disc from you and Mr. Munsil. I wonder what patterns should I pay more attention to, since contrast its not for calibration per se in HDR mode.

Thank you again