Epson Pro Cinema G6900 WU Projector: Calibration

Posted on February 24, 2014 by Art Feierman

PRO CINEMA G6900 WU PROJECTOR: CALIBRATION SETTTINGS - General and Grayscale settings. CMS calibration of the individual primary and secondary colors is on a second page called Advanced Calibration. That Advanced Calibration page is made available only to our paid subscribers.

G6900 WU General Image Settings

General Image Settings - Post Calibration: G6900 WU
Setting	Theatre	Dynamic	Presentation	Sports	sRGB	Multi
Contrast (0)	-1	-1	-1	-1	-1	-1
Brightness (0)	1	1	1	1	1	1
Saturation (0 for all)
Tint (0 for all)
Color Temp defaults	6500	7500	7500	7500	6500	6500
Auto Iris	On	On	Off	Off	Off	Off

Auto Iris is Off for all measurements.
All other settings at default (untouched)
Lens set to mid point on zoom, and Lamp mode on Normal unless noted
otherwise for measurements.

The empty cells for all modes, on the (Color) Saturation and Tint rows are empty because there was no need to change them for any mode, the default settings of 0 are all you need.

Eco Mode Lumen Measurements

Eco mode results in a drop of brightness, of between 36 and 37% based on Mike's measurements. He measured Dynamic mode at both full power and in Eco mode to come up with that percentage.

You may expect that same percentage drop regardless of the mode you select. That would apply just as well to a calibrated Theatre mode, as to an untouched Dynamic mode (or Theatre).

The drop of over 35% is a little greater than on most projectors, where the drop off is usually between 25 and 35%, depending on multiple factors.

Even in Eco mode, this is by far the brightest projector for the home, that we've played with/reviewed.

Color Temp for Different G6900 WU modes

G6900WU Measured with standard lens at mid-zoom, lamp at full power
Color Mode	Lumens	Color Temp
Dynamic	4744	6139
Presentation	3615	7749
Theatre	3808	6686
Sports	4207	6455
sRGB	3162	6711
Multi-Projection	3795	6685

Mike calibrated this projector, starting his calibration with the default Theatre settings. After doing the general calibration, the grayscale (color temp), and the CMS calibration of the individual primary and secondary colors, the G6900 WU measured in at 3796 lumens, almost identical to the uncalibrated measurement. (zoom lens at mid-point).

He also did a "quick-cal" of the brightest mode, Dynamic. In this case, he made only minor adjustments to the color temp settings, with the goal of making as much improvement in the picture as possible, without a significant drop in brightness. After all, the drop in brightness from Dynamic (uncalibrated) to a calibrated Theatre, is less than 30%.

The tables below provide the Color Temp (Grayscale) adjustments for both Theatre and Dynamic.

Grayscale Color Temp of Theatre Mode: Pre Calibration

Color Temp over IRE Range, Pre Calibration:
IRE	Theatre
100	6686K
80	6728K
50	6612K
30	6515K

For pre-calibration, these numbers (supposed to be as close to 6500K as possible) are exceptionally close for a "cross-over" projector - one designed primarily for business use.

This fits nicely into our description of a projector that has surprisingly good color, right out of the box, without any adjustments!

Grayscale - Color Temp Settings, Gamma, Post Calibration

Post Calibration Color Temp Settings
Settings	Calibration	"Quick-Cal"
	Theatre	Dynamic
Offset	R=-1	R= 0
	G= 0	G= 0
	B=-1	B= 0
Gain	R= 0	R= 3
	G= 0	G=-2
	B=-1	B= 0

Optimum Gamma Setting, per Mike, should be set to 2.

That setting is good for both modes.

Setting the Gamma for 2 measures a gamma of 2.13.

That would be close to the target 2.20 which is the correct gamma for movies. For things like sports and HDTV, people tend to like the gamma to be a little lower, close to 2.0.

Post Calibration Color Temperature, From 100 IRE (white) to 20 IRE (near black)

Post Calibration Color Temp from 100 IRE to 20 IRE
IRE	Theatre Mode
100	6500K
90	6516K
80	6508K
70	6454K
60	6534K
50	6504K
40	6532K
30	6347K
20	6683K

Post Calibration the Epson Pro Cinema G6900 WU is almost perfect from white (100 IRE down to 40 IRE (medium gray). Even the variation below that is very good, but it is truly impressive that the 100 - 40 range has a total measured variation of less than 50K which is pretty close to being an invisible difference. I'm impressed that a "crossover" projector, one coming from the commercial side, calibrates this tightly. Well done, and it explains the rather excellent color.