So you have a shiny new 4k HDR TV and a console that can do HDR gaming (at the time of writing this would be the PS4, PS4 Pro and the XboxOne S). However it doesn't seem to be as simple as turning the machine on and letting it do its job. It might say your TV is not HDR compatible. The blacks might be looking crushed. Maybe its not looking like you expected? Well this article will hopefully explain two things. Firstly what HDR actually is meant to do (as opposed to what some marketing might tell you) and secondly how to set up your TV so that HDR both works and looks how intended.
I'm am going to keep things as basic as possible without confusing people with to many terms and numbers because most people out there don't need to know the nitty gritty details. They just want to know what to expect and how to get it to work.
So what is HDR
HDR stands for High Dynamic Range. It's not a new idea as it has been around in many forms for a long time but these days a standard has started to emerge. Well two standards really. HDR10 and Dolby Vision. HDR10 is the one that the consoles are targeting despite Dolby Vision being the more advanced tech. But despite the differences they are setting out to achieve the same thing. A higher dynamic range of colour, shadow, highlight and luminance.What this means is that a non HDR TV (or SDR) has a set colour range within the RGB (Red Green Blue) space. HDR expands this so that the TV can now display a much larger variation of colours. But its not necessarily colours above or below this range, its additional colours in between. This means smoother and more realistic gradients of colour, shadow and highlight detail. They will look richer and more realistic.
The other thing it does is allow a much higher luminance. Basically it can go a lot brighter. Some to the point where you actually kind of need to squint. It's this luminance that some of the lower end TVs will miss out on the most but even with just the additional colour range and some luminance boost the image will look a lot higher quality than on an SDR TV.
To make it even simpler, an SDR TV might show you maybe 35% of what you can see with your eyes. An HDR TV might show anywhere from 50-90% depending on the TV you buy.
What should you expect to see?
This is where a lot of confusion comes in. I have seen plenty of people get their new TV expecting everything to POP on screen, colours to be out of this world and super bright. Well you can kind of make these TVs do that but that is not really what you should be expecting. HDR is actually meant to be about more realistic colour and brightness, not eye melting saturation. The biggest fault of this is marketing. It is a lot easier to sell something when you explain it as brighter, eye popping, high luminance etc because saying it looks more realistic wont sell. Most people look at their TVs and think it already looks realistic so what would they gain from that?Well it's one of those techs that has to really be seen to appreciate. No fake mock up will really show you what to expect. Take the example below:
This picture is trying to show you what to expect with HDR. But its is hugely inaccurate. The biggest and most obvious flaw is you can not show HDR on a non HDR display. So what you see in the HDR example is completely false because clearly you can view that on a normal display. Secondly, HDR doesn't tend to add much new colour like that. Normally displays can clearly show that blue. What you would actually get is more versions of the colours allowing more realistic colour representation and gradients. Also the additional luminance is completely missing from all these marketing pictures because, again. a normal display can't show you this anyway. The only thing slightly honest about that image is that you should see additional details in the highlights and shadows.
Lastly, I believe this is a shot from Rise of the Tomb raider which I don't believe actually supports HDR in the first place so......It is clearly a normal shot that has been photo shopped to try and look better and claim it is what HDR will do.
I get what they are trying to do. But it's false. Like when HD TVs came out and they tried to show what it would look like by blurring the normal image because obviously you cant see what HD looks like on a non HD TV. It is marketing and inaccurate so please don't believe it.
So to sum up. What you should expect is more accurate, richer colours with increased luminance where required (such as bright lights, sunlight etc) and increased details visible in the shadows and highlights.
How to set up the TV
The Internet is full of opinions on this one because their are people trying to explain how to set up your TV to get HDR to view as intended and then there are many people trying tell people how to set it up as they personally like it. There is nothing wrong with not using the settings designed to show HDR accurately. But it is wrong to tell people that is how it SHOULD be set up. If you like higher saturation, brighter shadows, extra contrast etc then by all means set you TV up accordingly. But that is not necessarily the correct way to have it set up.
So I will pick out some key settings here that you should set up to get it working and if you want to tweak these then by all means do so. It's your TV after all.
First make sure your console is set up appropriately. For PS4 and PS4 Pro there is a video option for things like colour range. Set all of them to automatic. XboxOne S has its own check list it goes through so follow that for some of these settings. Then move on to the TV settings.
Turn on UHD colour on your HDMI ports. The most important setting as it allows HDR to actually run. Each TV will be different and its likely not all your HDMI ports support HDR so read the manual (or sometimes the ports are colour coded) and plug your console into the correct port. Then go into the menus and find the setting to turn on UHD colour for that port.
Put your TV in Game Mode if it has one. This is a great setting that is a must for gaming. It turns off most the processing effects including some you don't have control over in the first place. This decreases input delay which is the time from when you press a button to something happening on screen. For example if I played on my TV in movie mode I would have a rather obvious half second delay from my actions when pressing a button. When in game mode it feels instant (although not actually being quite instant).
Black Level. This often has 2 settings. Sometimes called different things. But they basically mean black level support for full RGB or Limited RGB. This is something that can also be different for each TV but the best things you can do is simply switch between them till one looks right. When viewing SDR content, an incorrect setting will either crush the blacks (excessive black and dark patches all over the screen) or wash out the blacks (they all appear a grey colour rather than black). If it looks normal its correct. I only mention this because on my TV if i set it to automatic it looks fine in HDR but terrible in SDR. Where as in 'low' it looks great in both. So find out which one works in SDR so you don't have to keep changing settings when switching between SDR and HDR games.
Backlight. It is common to suggest the backlight needs to be set to max. While this is often the case it also depends on the room you are in. Mine is reasonably well lit and I do fine with it on 15. Its mainly because HDR content appears darker at the same settings as SDR.
Standard colour options. For these I mean things like brightness, contrast, colour etc. These can be left the same as for SDR content. Default is normally fine for these but tweak as you prefer.
Sharpness. You really shouldn't need any as what this does is sharpen the image at the cost of artifacting on the screen. But when viewing higher resolution content this is really something that shouldn't be needed. Set it between 0-10. I have mine on 5 just because. It's like a tiny tiny amount so that in my head it makes a difference (it prob doesn't).
Colour space. Another one that will vary from TV to TV. I use native because that allows access to the TVs whole expanded colour space. The other option is Auto which uses the sources colour space. You will have to make your own choice on this one because each TV model is different. Native on SDR content can appear over saturated on some TVs while on others can make the colours look better. On my TV I use native for both as I prefer the odd over saturation to the mostly under saturation that occurs. In HDR however the difference is a lot smaller but again I prefer Native.
Dynamic Contrast. Turn this off. I keep seeing people saying you need this on for HDR to work but its just not true. The problem is that HDR seems darker than SDR. But the first thing you should tweak to fix this is the in game brightness setting. In my experience it always needs to be a fair bit higher than when in SDR. All you will do when turning on dynamic contrast is brighten everything to the point that you lose details in the highlights and shadows, removing a lot of what HDR is meant to do in the first place. So if you like it on then that's fine but please don't tell people you NEED to have it on as for the full HDR range to be shown it actually needs to be off.
Colour Tone. This should really be at 'Warm 2'. What this should do is make white actually white. However the problem is you may be really used the the 'Standard' setting which adds a lot of blue. When you first try 'Warm 2' you may feel it just makes everything really yellow. But try it and stick with it for a day or 2 then see how you feel. A lot of people adjust and realise it is actually accurate now but if you still feel it is to yellow then drop it to 'Warm 1' and try again. But if you can stick to 'Warm2' that is meant to be accurate. Years of too much blue in your screens has tricked your eyes.
Turn off all other TV processing options. If you don't have a game mode or your game mode doesn't turn off all additional processing options, then this applies to you as well. TVs come with various processing options to 'improve' your picture. I personally turn them off for everything as all they really do is remove detail, over saturate the image and cause things like artifacting. They mostly turn everything up to max to catch your eye when in the TV shop but if you turn them all off and get used to it you will likely realise how bad they look when on. These settings include smooth motion (has various names), dynamic contrast and noise reduction.
With the above in place your TV should now be able to display HDR correctly. I'm sure there are some TVs that have other settings I am unaware of but these should be the main ones and are the common problem areas I have seen online.
I am by no means a TV expert. Just someone who got a 4k HDR TV and wants others to be able to enjoy theirs as best as possible. As I said at the start, if you enjoy having different settings then go for it. But this is a baseline for getting HDR to work and look as intended.
As an extra. If you simply want to see what HDR video looks like on your TV but have no 4k HDR blue ray player then I highly recommend the following. Go to http://demo-uhd3d.com/categorie.php?tag=hdr on your PC. Download some of those videos (the chess one is a great example). Copy them onto a USB stick. Plug that into your TV and watch. You will now get 4k HDR with no streaming compression. It really does look fantastic and is the best way to see what the fuss is all about.
