Since I’m an audio guy at heart I like to be able to relate concepts to their audio equivalent. Brightness and contrast are the bass and treble knobs of the video world. To get the most from your display device (tv, projector, plasma, etc.) you must properly set the video controls. The wrong settings will create silly-looking images that don’t seem real. The right settings will provide a natural picture that shows you what’s actually on the media you’re viewing.
Video Test Media
To “EQ” your display you’ll need some sort of media that provides a known signal you can watch while you tweak. There are many images available on the web that you can use to tweak simple settings such as brightness and contrast. If you want to set colors accurately you’ll need something a bit more advanced. I bought the Digital Video Essentials: HD Basics disc since it comes with color filters that you use to calibrate the individual red, green, and blue settings.
Another low-cost option is to go rent the movie UP. This movie (at least the Blu-ray version I rented) has a video calibration walk-through under the settings portion of the menu that has some good test images for brightness, contrast, and gamma.
Whatever media you choose, try to make sure it’s the same type of media (Blu-ray or DVD or online) that you watch most, that way your calibration images will be coming from the equipment you’ll actually be using to watch movies.
Brightness – Video Bass
The brightness control sets the black level of your display (silly name huh?). It controls the darkest detail that you can see, and how dark those details look. If it’s set too high then everything will seem washed-out and dull and if it’s set too low then you won’t be able to see the detail in shadows.
To properly set brightness on your display first set the room lighting to your normal viewing lighting. If you always watch movies at night then don’t calibrate your display in the middle of the day with the blinds open!
Bring up your brightness test image (it’s often the same one used to set contrast as well). If you need some image samples see here and here. Next you select the brightness control in your display’s menu. Note the current value, so if you have trouble you can go back to where you started. First turn the brightness up a bunch so you can see all the various shades of the test image. Then turn it down a until the darkest two shades blend together. Very slowly turn the control back up until the second-to-darkest shade is just barely lighter than the darkest one. This is the correct brightness setting.
Contrast – Video Treble
Now that brightness is done you can set contrast. Contrast controls how bright the bright stuff gets on your display. There are two types of brightness and contrast controls. The first type of controls are linked together, so when you change brightness it affects contrast and vice-versa. The other type are separate (much easier to use) and the controls don’t affect each other. I say this because when you’re setting contrast it might change how the brightness looks. If you notice that happening then you’ll have to play around with the controls until you get both correct.
Assuming your controls are separate, the procedure is pretty easy. Just crank the contrast control way down so you can see the various shades, then turn it up so that the brightest two shades blend together. Now ease it back down so the second-to-brightest shade is slightly darker than the brightest.
If the dark shades that you used to set brightness are still correct, then BAM, you’re done.
If the dark shades are screwed up, then you have the linked type of controls and you’ll need to keep tweaking. If the black shades are now lighter then turn the brightness control down until they almost blend together again. Now you’ll probably have to turn the contrast control up further so that the whites are correct. Keep adjusting until both ends of the spectrum look right.
With these two simple adjustments you can bring out much more detail and realism from your video material. Enjoy your new settings!
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