Epson Home Cinema 5020 Projector Calibration and Settings 2

Posted on July 18, 2013 by Art Feierman

HC5020 Greyscale Calibration based on THX Mode, placed in User Memory 1

Color Temp over IRE Range (Post calibration)
20 IRE	6719
30 IRE	6515
40 IRE	6474
50 IRE	6539
60 IRE	6503
70 IRE	6509
80 IRE	6564
90 IRE	6528
100 IRE	6517
Average gamma = 2.18

Epson HC5020 RGB Settings

HC5020 Post Calibration settings
	Rec. 709 (Memory 1)		Quick Cal of Dynamic (Memory 2)
Offset	R	1	R	0
	G	-3	G	0
	B	0	B	0
Gain	R	0	R	0
	G	4	G	-10
	B	-6	B	0
Gamma	2.2		2.0 (default)
Lumens	678@6517		1706@7036

Here are Mike's adjustments for the THX and Dynamic modes. Again the goal of "best" is a great looking 6500K grayscale, and the goal of "brightest" is to improve a bright mode in terms of color accuracy, but without compromising brightness significantly.

That covers the calibration data, except for CMS. More on that to be mentioned in my blog.

Mike's calibration comments: Overall, the 5020 is very similar in performance to the 5010. Lumen output is slightly higher in Dynamic mode with the 5020, but the biggest increase (169 lumens) is in the better picture quality modes (Cinema, THX, Natural). Grayscale is okay right out of the box and is virtually the same in THX, Cinema and Natural modes, with the correct red levels in the higher IREs, but it’s deficient in green and has too much blue. It calibrated extremely well (see graph), with Delta E under 2 for the entire range. This is an improvement over the 5010 we tested, which had a huge jump at 100 IRE as the red tapped out. The gamma settings are more accurate than they were with the 5010, with the average gamma coming in at only 0.02 less than the preset value (2.18 vs. 2.2). Similarly, setting gamma at 2.3 yielded an average gamma of 2.27. There are extensive gamma settings available, but, like the 3020e, the simple gamma setting is so good, most people won’t need to use them.

The Quick Cal of Dynamic reduces the green that’s apparent in whites, but it causes a rapid drop in lumen output and also starts to look too red with light grays. Living Room mode has a better picture and its output of over 1400 lumens is probably sufficient for most uses.

The color gamut is quite good by default in THX mode, with Red too high in absolute luminance and Green being off the Rec. 709 target mark. Blue was fairly good, but oversaturated. The secondaries were generally good, with only Magenta being noticeably off the mark in hue. Green and red couldn’t be completely moved into alignment with the CMS, but they were close enough and everything in normal viewing appeared accurate. Skin tones were better than the 3020, but the skin tone setting is subtle enough that if you think there’s a touch too much red, you can tone it down with that control.