Picture grainy during dark scenes

[GreenMotion]

Overall the picture quality of my blu-ray discs are amazing (Total Recall excluded) ... and the latest additions to my collection (POTC1 & POTC2) look amazing as well.

However, I have noticed, that during dark scenes, the picture is a tad grainy. Not just with POTC, but also with some other movies.

Has anyone else experienced this? I have tried various settings on my Plasma (Standard, Cinema, Vivid etc. etc) but it really doesn't make much of a difference.

Once again, this is during dark scenes only. Everything else looks amazing.

I am using the PS3 as the player, and have a 600U Panasonic 50inch 1080i Plasma.

[blindedcoon]

Hello, How high is your contrast and brightness set? sometimes that will give you the "grainy" effect.??

[Blue]

Yes. Have noticed grain in dark scenes in Planet Earth. Remember the darker the scene the more grain (no matter how expensive the camera). DVD does not have the ability to show grain to any degree, whereas Blu-ray will expose any imperfection for all to see.

[GreenMotion]

Originally Posted by Blue

Yes. Have noticed grain in dark scenes in Planet Earth. Remember the darker the scene the more grain (no matter how expensive the camera). DVD does not have the ability to show grain to any degree, whereas Blu-ray will expose any imperfection for all to see.

That's what I was thinking, but it's nice to get comfirmation. Thanks

[Greenmatiz2]

My 1080p TV I had replaced due to clouding issues used to really show the grain in detail. My 1080i plasma I now have doesn't show so much grain.

I think LCDs can be so sharp, they make the grain rather harsh at times.

[HDJK]

Also try to turn off any noise reduction on your TV. As Blue said, grain is more apparent in darker scenes, and if your TV messes with it, it can actually make things worse.

[Deciazulado]

Originally Posted by GreenMotion

Overall the picture quality of my blu-ray discs are amazing (Total Recall excluded) ... and the latest additions to my collection (POTC1 & POTC2) look amazing as well.

However, I have noticed, that during dark scenes, the picture is a tad grainy. Not just with POTC, but also with some other movies.

Has anyone else experienced this? I have tried various settings on my Plasma (Standard, Cinema, Vivid etc. etc) but it really doesn't make much of a difference.

Once again, this is during dark scenes only. Everything else looks amazing.

I am using the PS3 as the player, and have a 600U Panasonic 50inch 1080i Plasma.

This is a normal characteristic of photographic film and the way movies (and photographs) are made.

In high brightness conditions (daylight, controlled studio lighting, etc) you have great amounts of light so you can use slow (less sensitive to light) film which is sharper and finer grained. For darker conditions, like at night or outside of studio conditions where light is not as easly controlable, you need faster (more sensitive to light) coarser grained film. Why is fast film grainier? Well a simple explanation is that you have bigger grains that have more surface to be exposed by the light, and have more of them. This is also indirectly why the grainier the film, the less sharp the image: finer sized grain (like more closely packed pixels in higher resolution cameras) can give you a more detailed reproduction with better delineation, and be coated in thinner layers on the emulsion, which also preserves photographic sharpness. The penalty is the need for more light, making filming harder. This is also why Large Formats are better than smaller formats. You can use a grainier film, but since the large format negative doesn't have to be enlarged so much, you don't see the grain as much.

This happens also in digital, less light = less signal to noise ratio = more noise. Also compression algorythms, since we see less in the dark, the dark tones might be compressed more than the light ones (darker scene may be compressed more) so maybe it's compressed a little too much, or the black level settings on the display are too high unmasking the compression scheme, which is counting on the darkness of the image to hide it.

[GreenMotion]

Hey everyone; thanks for all the replies. Much appreciated!