Display Calibration and RGB, black levels

My Panasonic plasma TV supports full RGB mode but I cannot see the "closed eye" in the Xbox One display calibration procedure no matter what combination of settings I use (unless I set Xbox to RGB Limited 16-255). Even when I use the limited RGB setting
and match it/calibrate my TV to see the closed eye, I am finding a lot of crushed blacks and poor black levels in games. I have googled and found many people with the same problem and no apparent way to fix. Anyone have solutions or will MS fix this in the
future?

:)

 

full rgb does not work on a full rgb tv

Hi,

i've got a new Sony 55 W905 TV. I've set both the HDMI input of the tv and the Xbox One to full rgb. But full rgb is not working. When performing the display calibration app, i've never see the black closed eye. Regardless if i set brightness to max or whatever.

nehW .

 

Anyone Getting a Random Blackscreen with Apps?

For anyone looking i've resolved the problem. It has to do with the Color Space settings in Settings>Display and Sound.

When it was switched to PC (RGB FULL) I was getting the occasional black screen on apps as noted above. In my testing i noticed this was only happening with a dark screen, I.E. a dark black loading screen or a dark area in a movie. What i can only assume
is that RGB FULL has a black level that is not supported by the HDTV. (Note that this was tested with a VIZIO 60' LED HDTV, just for reference)

THE FIX: Change it back to TV (RGB Limited), and if needed go through the TV Calibration to correct the color levels as you see fit.

The issue hasn't come back since making these changes for me. Hopfully this helps anyone else that stubbles on this thread looking for a solution.

 

This was an issue on the Xbox 360 and it was never fixed, so don't hold your breath.

The issue is that the Xbox seems to output 0-255 black levels when set to RGB limited, causing the black and white levels to be crushed, even when the tv is set to RGB limited.

And then when setting it to RGB Full, it seems to output even lower black levels and higher white levels, such that the black and white levels are still crushed when the TV is set to RGB Full, and even MORE crushed when set to RGB limited

Setting the Xbox to RGB Limited and the TV to RGB Full seems to make the blacks and whites look normal, but intermediate shades (and colors) are washed out.

The only workaround I've been able to find is to set the Xbox One's "TV Connection" setting to "DVI", which seems to fix the RGB limited and RGB full settings to their proper black levels, but you no longer have sound over HDMI.

The best way I've found to test the black levels on the XB1 is to save a copy of the Lagom LCD black levels test image:

www.lagom.nl/.../black.php

and these grayscale gradient test images:

www.lydogbilde.no/.../75285378.fButmPlS.GreyscaleStep8.jpg

www.sixfortyfive.com/.../calibration_white.png

to SkyDrive, and view them on the console each time I change a setting.

 

Has there been any suggestions or news on this yet? JTF195 - I'm seeing the exact same issues with my setup as well. Looks to be outputting at RGB full regardless, and blacks are getting crushed. For now I'm just swapping my TV into RGB full (normally it's
in limited) for XBONE use. Would be nice not to have to do this every time...

 

As of the most recent Xbox 360 and Xbox One updates, the problem is still not fixed.

I have my TV calibrated and configured properly. I have tested it with my both my PS3 and PC set to RGB Full and RGB Limited, and my Wii U (which outputs RGB Limited)

It works perfectly with all 3 devices.

On both the Xbox 360 and Xbox One, however, the output from the both the RGB Full and RGB limited options have 16 levels of black crushing and 16 levels of white crushing when the TV is set to the corresponding mode, and only look normal when the TV is set
to RGB Full, and the Xbox is set to RGB Limited.

I don't have recording equipment, but others have recorded output and tested the black levels in photoshop to verify this issue.

Essentially the problem breaks down as follows:

Black Levels

15-239

- PS RGB Limited option, Wii U, PC RGB Limited output

0-255

- Xbox RGB Limited option, PS RGB Full option, PC RGB Full output

(-16)-271 (values out of range by 16 levels)

- Incorrect Xbox RGB Full option

 

This is a mis-understanding of how video and PC levels work, and what the proper setting for these controls are. It doesn't help that the RGB Full and Limited terminology is what everyone uses, as opposed to "RGB TV" and "RGB PC" or something else.

All non-PC video content, from HDTV to Blu-ray and DVD, uses the video levels. Those are from 16-235. There is nothing below 16, it is only black, and nothing above 235, which is only white. There should be no content that falls into this space as TVs are
not meant to show it. Some TVs might let you adjust them to the point of showing content below 16 or above 235, but you likely shouldn't. Doing so will reduce shadow detail, reduce highlights, and reduce the contrast ratio of your TV making it look worse.
There also should be no content in there, so you aren't seeing anything else.

PC monitors use the full 0-255 RGB range. Additionally all games are produced using this range since they are all produced on PCs. 0 is black, 255 is white, and it is much easier to grasp.

What RGB Limited does is display content using that 16-235 range that TVs use. For DVD and Blu-ray movies, this simply means keeping them in their native format. For video games, this means it converts them to 16-235 from 0-255 on the fly.

RGB Full does the opposite. It keeps video games in the 0-255 range while converting movies and TV content to the full scale. Otherwise you would have grayish blacks and dull whites.

What this really means is you should always use RGB Limited unless you are using a PC monitor, which is designed to use RGB Full. If you do not, you're expanding the video range outside of what your TV should display and you're losing shadow and highlight
details. Additionally, if you setup your TV to work with RGB Full, anything else plugged into it is going to look dull and washed out.

The RGB Full setting inside a TV typically means it accepts values below 16 or above 235 over HDMI. Many TVs will just throw that data out because it isn't useful to them since they aren't meant to display it.

Basically, use RGB Limited unless using a PC Monitor. Only then should you use RGB Full. I'll write up an article about this to help clear it up as it's understandably confusing.

 

AVwriter is correct, you should be using RGB Limited, not full..

I have a panasonic plasma aswell and have no issues.. Running 36 bit, in RGB limited and TV calibrated in THX mode and have zero issues..

 

The naming of "Limited" and "Full" is a poor choice but it was taken directly from the HDMI spec. Both RGB Limited and RGB Full output the full range from 0-255. The difference is RGB limited has "reference" black at 16 and "reference" white at 235. The
values below 16 and above 235 are still present. In fact, 254 is considered "peak" white in RGB Limited. The area between reference and peak white is for specular highlights. RGB Full has "reference" black at 0 and "reference" white at 255. There is no concept
of peak white. There is no room saved for specular highlights in RGB Full.

As AVwriter mentions, this is content specific.

referencehometheater.com/.../rgb-full-vs-limited

 

All of you are correct in describing how RGB Full and RGB Limited are SUPPOSED to work.

On every device I own EXCEPT the Xbox 360 and Xbox One, the options for RGB Limited and RGB Full DO work this way.

On the Xbox 360 and Xbox One, however, the RGB Limited option outputs RGB Full, and the RGB Full option is completely broken.

 

XB1 display calibration in Full RGB, now called 'PC', is not helpful for any display I own. Try the AVSHD 709 tools. I can get almost every level on my equipment with an XB1 set to 'PC'. Limited RGB, now call 'TV', should look pretty much the same on properly
adjusted TVs. Here's the link to the tools.

www.avsforum.com/.../948496-avs-hd-709-blu-ray-mp4-calibration.html

 

A long post follows....

RGB TV / RGB Limited means content is mastered at 16 = black and 235 = white.

RGB PC / RGB Full means content is mastered at 0 = black and 255 = white.

No matter what settings you select in your TV or the XB1, when a source outputs RGB, it sends 8bits (0-255) per channel (unless you select a higher bit depth, but that's for a different discussion).

If you have a source that is outputting RGB Limited for RGB Limited and your TV is set to RGB Limited, the TV should be calibrated so that 16 = black and 235 = white. The way this is usually done is through calibration patterns that have information below
16 or above 235, also known as blacker than black or whiter than white. For the XB1, this is the top/bottom black/white bars and the closed eye and sun in the built in calibration program. When a display chain such as this is calibrated properly, you're
not supposed to see the closed eye or the sun, and the top two and bottom two bars should look the same color. If you can see the closed eye or sun, then the display is to bright and/or to contrast-y.

If you have a source that is outputting RGB Full and your TV is set to RGB Full, the TV should be calibrated so that 0 = black and 255 = white. Here is where the confusion starts. To properly expand content mastered for RGB Limited (most all TV and movies,
and likely other content as well), the device accepting the RGB Limited content and outputting RGB Full is responsible for expanding this properly. That necessarily means clipping below black and above white. For 8 bit RGB, you can't send higher than 255,
and there are no negative RGB values. In this case, no matter how bright you set your TV, you'll never see the closed eye. It's impossible to see blacker than black on RGB full showing content mastered for RGB Limited. If you are seeing below black or above
white, then that means the program expanding the RGB Limited mastered content is not expanding properly.

Now, with that said, I think there are some issues. I have no knowledge other than my hunches about how the XB1 works. My hunch is that it either treats all apps as having content mastered for RGB Limited and applies the expansion to all games/apps/movies/etc.
Or, the game/app can tell the system that it's content is RGB Limited or RGB Full so the XB1 can expand/not expand as necessary. If it's the latter option, then I think apps like IE don't properly advertise their content is RGB full. Also, apps like the
Media Player photo viewer should be RGB Full, while the video player in the Media Player app should be RGB Limited. That's why when you set the XB1 to RGB TV and your display to RGB Full, photos and content on IE look right, because you're basically turning
off the RGB Limited -> RGB Full expander. But, that only fixes RGB Full content. When you do that, anything mastered for RGB Limited will look very washed out. I've read where most developers target RGB Limited, so I'm wondering if the XB1 just assumes
all content is RGB Limited and expands carte blanche. If that's the case, then it seems like the "fix" is to allow an app to tell the system if it's content is RGB Limited or RGB Full so the XB1 can properly apply the 16-235 -> 0-255 expander.

So, if you see games that look "more correct" when the XB1 is set to RGB TV and your display is set to RGB Full, then I suspect the game has been mastered to RGB Full and the XB1 is normally incorrectly applying the RGB expander. With the XB1 set to RGB
TV and your display set to RGB Limited or the XB1 set to RGB PC and your display set to RGB Full, you'd be crushing blacks/whites, and I suspect this is what most people are seeing. The developers have "worked around" the issue by mastering games to RGB Limited,
which for people with displays that accept RGB Full result in a slightly reduced number of total available colors.

 

Heya FalconRD!

Thanks for helping out in this thread. Be sure to help out in newer threads, as this thread is quite old and if you have any questions let us know with a new thread