How to make a video look good on both the computer and TV

[Norman Black]

When you say, looks good on TV, what device is feeding the video stream to the TV? DVD, Blu-Ray, internet, media PC?

I’ll disagree that TV has more contrast and colors. Rec 709 (HDTV) and sRGB (typical computer display) are pretty similar color spaces. Nearly identical in fact.

Rec 709 in a digital encoding format is a bit more compressed with a 16-235 numeric range verses full computer range 0-255. This reduces the number of color shades available.

This 16-235 issue is a common problem with video playback since many camera sources are 0-255. This changes color and contrast if encoded without compensation.

If I take my 0-255 camera source and do not compensate, then on playback in a media player, the contrast jumps, blacks are crushed, whites are blown.

[Darren Hugh]

I’m streaming my videos from a computer by sing a HDMI cabel.

Thanks for the information

[John Rofrano]

[Darren Hugh] “Is there any simple ways to make it look good both ways?”

The short answer is no. As Norman explained a TV uses 16-235 luminance while your computer uses 0-255. I would grade for TV because most media players will expand the luminance to compensate.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Darren Hugh]

God I hate this kind of video editing! Thanks for replies both of you.

[Darren Hugh]

While i’m at it. Do you know why the preview window on the external monitor is different to the outcome? When I click the external monitor the window opens on my TV, however the rendering outcome looks alot different in terms of contrast and color correction then what it is in the preview…

[John Rofrano]

[Darren Hugh] “Do you know why the preview window on the external monitor is different to the outcome?”

Probably because your monitors aren’t calibrated with a hardware calibrator. Are they?

[Darren Hugh] “When I click the external monitor the window opens on my TV, however the rendering outcome looks alot different in terms of contrast and color correction then what it is in the preview…”

If you are really using a consumer TV? Then you found your problem! Every TV set is different by design so that manufactures can differentiate their products. Unless you are using a calibrated broadcast monitor to check your work you are wasting your time. The TV in my bedroom looks totally different than the TV in my living room. One is a a Samsung and the other is a Sony. Welcome to TV land. Some people say NTSC stands for Never The Same Colors 😉

The other problem might be that you are grading for Computer RGB and all TV’s are Studio RGB. Check your waveform monitor in Vegas and see if your video falls within the Studio RGB range. If it doesn’t that’s another reason why a TV will make it look different (i.e., because it can’t display the luminance levels that you are sending it).

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Darren Hugh]

Thank you for the well detailed reply. Really appreciate it.

Ive found out adding the Levels Fx with Computer to studio filter makes it looks alot better when watching the TV monitor (obviously looks horrible with the computer).

The TV should be calibrated, as I paid for them to do so when I bought my new tv a couple of weeks ago. I am however hoping that if I calibrate the images so that they look descent enough on my TV with standard image settings it will hopefully look ok if ever watched on other tv monitors then mine. So, what do you think?

The outcome is only made for family use, still pretty eager to get the best looking image.

Thanks again for the reply and help.

[John Rofrano]

[Darren Hugh] “Ive found out adding the Levels Fx with Computer to studio filter makes it looks alot better when watching the TV monitor (obviously looks horrible with the computer).”

Yea, but it doesn’t have to be. You can add Sony Levels to bring the levels within SRGB range but then you need to add Sony Color Curves and adjust it to bring back the contrast that you lost by applying levels. There is no reason for picture to not look good on both TV and computer, You need to adjust it to have the same dynamic range within the SRGB space.

[Darren Hugh] “The TV should be calibrated, as I paid for them to do so when I bought my new tv a couple of weeks ago. I am however hoping that if I calibrate the images so that they look descent enough on my TV with standard image settings it will hopefully look ok if ever watched on other tv monitors then mine. So, what do you think?”

Did they calibrate it to edit video giving a flat response or did they calibrate it to watch movies where you want the blacks blacker and the whites whiter? If you told them you were using it as a broadcast monitor substitute for editing video then they may have calibrated it correctly. What about your computer monitor. How was that calibrated?

[Darren Hugh] “The outcome is only made for family use, still pretty eager to get the best looking image.”

Since you are not doing this professionally, and I assume don’t want to spend a lot in hardware calibrators, you might want to send Color Bars to both from the Vegas Pro timeline and see how close they are and then try and adjust them to match. The Spyder 4 Elite hardware calibrator works on both TV’s and computer monitors and is not that expensive ($250) if you really want to get everything calibrated correctly.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Dave Haynie]

[Norman Black] “I’ll disagree that TV has more contrast and colors. Rec 709 (HDTV) and sRGB (typical computer display) are pretty similar color spaces. Nearly identical in fact.”

Similar enough color spaces, sure. But a typical LCD PC monitor these days has a low contrast ratio, usually around 1000:1. Ok, some of the newer models have a dynamic/LED mode, but that’s usually disabled by default. CRT for television is usually a minimum of 20,000:1, and you’ll get better range from pretty much every modern television… of course the LCD televisions are using dynamic backlighting to achieve their extended dynamic range.

It’s also a question of your target, modern or ancient TVs. If you’re thinking of an old CRT, you have NTSC issues to contend with. Digital televisions will certainly accept and upconvert NTSC, but they’ve never had to deal with NTSC color, interlace, or any of that nonsense in their native mode — in fact, most current televisions don’t have an interlaced mode; they’ll scan convert it to some form of progressive.

And of course, on a PC, you also have to contend with the fact that your display program isn’t necessarily synched to the actual refresh rate. Most folks pop up a player, and that player is just dumping data into the video card’s frame buffer. The buffer may be updating at 24p, but the screen is probably being refreshed at 60p. There’s usually enough sync, or double-buffering, to avoid updates of the live display, but still, it’s going to look much different on a television, where the video is displayed in sync with the display.

-Dave