The difference between good and poor picture quality can be seen by anybody. However, it is not very easy to understand the technical issues that make a picture look good. One very important element of picture quality is contrast ratio. Other aspects are the color saturation and color accuracy, and resolution is also very important.
The ratio between the darkest and brightest color your HDTV can produce is called contrast ratio. Your HDTV has high performance if the contrast ratio is high. Low color ratio means a dull experience: pictures will be washed out and details can be lost. However, it is unlikely you will buy an HDTV with poor contrast ratio. In recent years technology has improved greatly, which means even cheaper systems have fairly decent contrast ratios. Obviously best contrast ratios are expensive, but this is also getting cheaper.
Black levels are also very important: it can be very annoying to see grayish blacks when the user expects absolute black image. Poor black levels are especially visible in dim light conditions: this is when your eyes are very sensitive to dark images. To achieve absolute black, a lot of people set black levels too low: this is a mistake, because this way black shadow detail will be lost.
High white levels make the images on the screen appear vivid and lively. This makes the viewing more pleasant. Again, lot of people make a mistake by setting the white levels too high: this way certain details and bright highlights can be lost.
Important characteristics of the images on your display are color temperature, saturation and accuracy. 6500K, corresponding to daytime illumination, is the standard for color temperature. This is the natural light temperature. Everything above this is bluish, and everything below is yellow or reddish. If the color temperature is not set properly, every color will be bluish or reddish.
The color saturation of your HDTV can be adjusted by using the color patterns that come with calibrations discs or TV channels. Color accuracy is a function of how your system decodes image data. Color accuracy is a wide topic: if you don’t want to be a pro, it is enough for you to know that the color reproduction is accurate when the color encoding used in film production match the decoders of your HDTV.
Color reproduction is also affected by factors like greyscale and the display characteristic (gamma) of your TV. But this is beyond the beginner-level image calibration. If you find this is an important issue, you will have learn about image calibration, or you will have to pay a specialist to do this.
The best HD resolutions today have 5 times more pixels than the old Standard Definition. The old format can not be compared to HD images: today, every detail of the image can be seen sharply. If you want to have the best technology available today, buy a 1080 capable HDTV.
Percieved sharpness also relates to resolution, and is similar to the edge contrast concept used in photography. Users can artificially sharpen the image by creating a crispier edge along the image border: this gives the impression of better image quality. Oversharpening is a mistake, because this creates halo artifacts around images.
Edward is an electronics expert who writes hdtv reviews. To read more panasonic hdtv reviews, visit HDTVReviewLab.com
