There has been some discussion here and elsewhere about issues arising from calibrating one of the new Sharp Elite LCDs.
I have now had more time to spend with one and here's what I found.
1.Select the THX mode.
2.You can leave the dynamic LED function on, but not in one of the advanced modes.
3.Use the 10-point grayscale feature. It yields excellent results. You can get nearly perfect grayscale tracking with a ruler flat gamma at 2.2.
4.I would not spend any time on the color management system, but if you do ensure that you use 75% intensity test patterns. You cannot get decent results with 100% patterns at all.
The problem with the CMS is that the colors on the Sharp will not track in a linear fashion between 100% and 75% intensity (as indicated above). Color will also not track in linear way throughout the color space. This is true even if you use an external CMS, such as provided on a Lumagen or DVDO Duo. When you average the dE results throughout the color space (and not just at the gamut boundary), you get no better color after calibration than you had before doing anything. This is not as bad as it sounds, because the default color in the THX is pretty good anyway.After calibrating using 75% test patterns, I got excellent results at the gamut boundary, and if that's all you looked at you would think that you had significantly improved the color performance. However, that's an illusion that is revealed when you look inside the color space.
Note: The ACM module in ChromaPure uses 100% intensity test patterns. Based on this experience we will add 75% patterns as a user-selectable option. Nonetheless, the point remains that good color performance should results in little or no difference between 75% and 100% intensity. With this display, the differences are dramatic.
THX pre-calibration:
Post-Calibration results:
Results with Lumagen:
Variations in luminance error at different levels of saturation:
Variations in dE at various levels of saturation: