Until now,
Digital Video Essentials was pretty much the only legitimate option when it came to
calibrating via Blu-ray player. At long last, a little competition has stepped into the field. Stacey Spears and Don Munsil -- creators of the DVD Player Benchmark and Progressive Scan Shootout at Secrets of Home Theater and High Fidelity -- has just released the
Spears & Munsil High Definition Benchmark: Blu-ray Edition. The disc is chock full of test material and calibration patterns to help HD junkies adjust their home theater systems for optimal playback, and according to co-creator Stacey Spears, all of the material was created from scratch. Coincidentally enough, this very disc was bundled with our
OPPO BDP-83 test deck, but given that it's on sale now at Amazon and direct from OPPO, we suppose that's not too terribly shocking. MSRP is pegged at $24.99, and you'll find lots more details waiting in the read link.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
L3 @ Mar 23rd 2009 9:24PM
I expect 'very long wait' or 'unavailable.'
Covarr @ Mar 23rd 2009 9:59PM
I can't see myself paying for a calibration disc when AVS HD 709 is free.
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=948496
cwnyc @ Mar 23rd 2009 11:37PM
Wow, THANKS!!!!
Doc @ Mar 24th 2009 2:21PM
Thanks for the great link, I had no idea this even existed !!! Once again, thanks...friendo
WiFiSpy @ Mar 25th 2009 9:57AM
This disc includes a demo video that was shot on the RED Camera!
acme @ Mar 23rd 2009 11:34PM
I'm wondering if this disc is the kind that needs those blue glasses to get the right colors etc...
Nelson @ Mar 24th 2009 12:59PM
The Digital Video Essentials Blu-ray calibration disc includes the blue/red/green filter to help you get the colors correctly.
nathan @ Mar 24th 2009 2:56PM
I just tried out this disc and was impressed with the test screens for setting black level (brightness) and white level (contrast). They are more nuanced than what's on DVE Blu-ray, and helped me dial things in a touch better/more precisely.
That said, there are far fewer patterns of things like full screen IRE patterns so doing a complete gray scale calibration using this disc would be tough.
James @ Mar 24th 2009 4:27PM
Thanks!
Stacey Spears @ Mar 27th 2009 9:58PM
I am the co-creator of the disc and thought I would chime in.
To adjust color and tint you need to look at the blue channel. One way to do this is to use a filter that removes red and green, aka the blue filter. The problem is filters work well on one display technology and not always another. We are trying to find a filter that will work well accross the board. The same applies to red and green filters. We don't believe it is possible to actually use a filter for green.
The AVS HD 709 disc is nice. It includes window and field patterns you need to adjust grayscale. CalMAN can use the AVS disc along with others for auto calibration. Digital Video Essentials also offers these types of patterns and more.
The Spears & Munsil disc includes a 3-minute montage that was shot entirely on the RED ONE camera at 4096x2048. While you will view it at 1080p, or less, the result is a noise free image that serves as good demo material for your home theater.
The audio on the montage is provided in PCM, Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD MA. This is probably the first true apples-to-apples comparison of the audio codecs. The Dolby Digital, which is included with TrueHD, is at 640 Kbps. The DTS core is at 1.5 Mbps. There are also Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD MA 7.1 trailers.
The disc includes a number of film and video deinterlacing clips that will help you evaluate your a Blu-ray player, video processor or display. This is useful if you are looking to upgrade or want to know how well your system performs now. These tests are available in both HD and SD, which will allow you to not only test native HD, but up conversion too.
There is on-screen help for every clip with examples of good and bad behavior. The on-screen help is available in PDF format here: http://www.spearsandmunsil.com/pdf/UG_SM_HD_Benchmark.pdf
You can see menus from the disc here: http://www.spearsandmunsil.com/hdbenchmark.html
The disc is not for everyone. For those interested, we are happy to answer any questions you may have.
BBWW @ May 26th 2009 12:20PM
Hi Stacey,
Has the blue filter been sought and available from any source? Please advise. Thanks.
William