Should I Run-in my New TV/Projector before having it Calibrated?

It’s best practice to allow your new display to be run-in for 200 hours before calibration. This is because displays tend to behave differently after having some time to ‘settle-in’ and there’s the very real possibility that a TV calibrated ‘fresh out of the box’ will lose some of its accuracy after having accumulated some serious viewing hours.

The exception to this rule is if you find a calibrator who is happy to book in a touch up calibration after your display has accumulated enough viewing hours.

How Long Will It Take To Calibrate My Display?

Allow between 2-3 hours to have your display calibrated and longer if your setup is more complex. I also prefer (if possible) to have my customer present during at least part of the calibration. This allows me to explain what I’m doing and more importantly why I’m doing it!

Your Viewing Environment

Your viewing environment is going to play an important role in getting the best picture from your display. To help create a more immersive movie watching experience, the viewing environment needs to have little or no ambient light. However, this is not always practical, particularly if you like to watch sport during the day!

To overcome this, your calibrator will determine if you need to have an additional calibrated mode, which is optimised for daytime viewing.

Does my 3D Projector or TV Need A Separate Calibration for 3D Movies?

One of the things you will notice when wearing 3D glasses is that your display doesn’t look anywhere near as bright as it does without them. In addition to the loss of brightness introduced by the glasses, it’s likely your glasses also have a slight tint, which will introduce a noticeable colour shift into images. How much brightness your display will lose and how large a colour shift your glasses introduce will depend on the brand and type of your glasses and display.

If you enjoy watching 3D movies, your calibrator will recommend that you have your display calibrated for both 2D and 3D viewing. This means your calibrator will do a completely ‘new’ calibration for 3D movie watching. During this step they will be repeating the calibration process described in Part 2 (Projector & TV Calibration A Walkthrough), but all measurements will be taken by aiming their metre through the glasses. This will take into account both the loss in brightness and any colour tint that your glasses introduce and provide you with the most accurate picture for 3D viewing.

Can My Display be calibrated?

As displays have improved, so too has the range of calibration controls available. In fact, if you’re buying a name- brand display, it’s hard to find one without the controls needed for calibration! That said, at a minimum, your display should have greyscale or white balance controls. When you are booking your calibration your calibrator will confirm that your display is indeed able to be calibrated.

Do I get a Calibration Report?

After your calibration has been completed, you can expect two reports from your calibrator. The first report will contain all of the calibrated settings for your display. The second report (sample page below) will show the pre and post calibration performance of your display. This report will contain many of the graphs which we discussed in Part 2. In the unlikely event that you lose both your calibrated TV settings (e.g. firmware update) and the report containing your post-calibration settings, you can usually request a copy from your calibrator.

Go forth and calibrate! ;-)

After having your display professionally calibrated you will be rewarded with a far more immersive and accurate viewing experience. The only downside is you’re going to develop an intolerance for un-calibrated displays!

If you have opted to sit in on the calibration process, you will also have gained some insight into how your display’s calibration controls work and the elements that make up a great movie watching experience!

Thank you for taking the time to read these articles. I have enjoyed writing them and hope they have been of value to you. If you have any questions about TV or Projector calibration, please feel free to ask me on the forums, or contact me via my website and I will answer your questions as best as I can. If you would like to have your display calibrated, you can reach me via my website.

About the Author

Tony O'Brien is the owner of Adelaide based 'Clarity Audio & Video Calibration', providing calibration services to home theatre owners and video production companies for film and TV. He is an ISF Certified calibrator.
For more information visit http://www.claritycalibration.com.au