LG HU80KA Review: A Smart Laser Projector for Home - Advanced Calibration

Posted on October 1, 2018 by Art Feierman

LG HU80KA Projector Review – Advanced Calibration: CMS Calibration, Calibration Charts

CMS Settings for Best Mode calibration – Expert (Dark Room) Mode

LG HU80KA Expert (Dark Room) Mode Pre-Calibration CIE 1976 Saturation Sweeps (target REC.709)

LG HU80KA Expert (Dark Room) Mode Post-Calibration CIE 1976 Saturation Sweeps (target REC.709)

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RGBCMY	Saturation	Tint	Luminance
Red	17	-12	10
Green	-4	4	4
Blue	-1	-24	7
Cyan	4	-17	7
Magenta	-2	26	5
Yellow	-11	-4	2

Color and CMS performance was again just ok. There are 3 setting options for color gamut (Auto, Wide, Extended) By default it is set to Auto which usually is the closest to REC.709. If you take a look at the pre-calibration color gamut chart you will notice some of the colors look way off target and this is mainly because all of the colors stem from the white point which in this case is quite blue/purple. So, improving the white point with my white balance calibration made big improvements to all the colors.

Once that was done I chose Wide as my color gamut hoping it would help with the red under saturation. Sadly, it had little effect and there were still some lingering problems. Cyan was still running towards blue getting worse at the higher saturation points. Blue was still blowing past its REC.709 100% saturation point. Again, red had the opposite problem with its 100% saturation point just reaching the 80% mark. Through CMS calibration I was able to improve all of these errors a bit except for red still maxing out at 80% saturation and blue being over saturated at 100%.

CMS Settings for Brightest calibration – Standard Mode

LG HU80KA Standard Mode Pre-Calibration CIE 1976 Saturation Sweeps (target REC.709)

LG HU80KA Standard Mode Post-Calibration CIE 1976 Saturation Sweeps (target REC.709)

❮ ❯

RGBCMY	Saturation	Tint	Luminance
Red	n/a	n/a	n/a
Green	n/a	n/a	n/a
Blue	n/a	n/a	n/a
Cyan	n/a	n/a	n/a
Magenta	n/a	n/a	n/a
Yellow	n/a	n/a	n/a

Well there is really not much to say here as there are no CMS controls available in Standard mode. The improvements you do see in the before and after CMS charts come from 2 picture settings, color temp being set from Medium to Warm and color gamut being set from Wide to Auto. Without CMS controls post-calibration color gamut is not good with blue over saturated quite a bit, magenta over saturated and running towards blue. Cyan also running towards blue and red under saturated, running out of gas around the 85% mark.

CMS Settings for 4K HDR – Standard (HDR) Mode

LG HU80KA Standard (HDR) Mode Pre-Calibration P3 Saturation Sweeps inside BT.2020

LG HU80KA Standard (HDR) Mode Post-Calibration P3 Saturation Sweeps inside BT.2020

❮ ❯

Just like with my Brightest Mode calibration there are no CMS controls available in Standard (HDR) mode. The improvements you do see in the before and after CMS charts come from setting the Color Temp from Medium to Warm. Without CMS controls post-calibration P3 color gamut is quite a mess. Red maxes out around 70% saturation but is not very linear with the lower saturation points (20%,40% & 60%) erroring towards magenta while the outer points (80% & 100%) moving towards yellow. Even if I had CMS controls fixing one error would worsen the other. Magenta is pushing towards blue and most likely would be improved with calibration, same with cyan. Other issues cannot be fixed with calibration. Like Red, cyan & green maxed out at 70% saturation and some of their saturation points sitting near or on top of each other, far from their targets. Only Blue and magenta reach 100% P3 color gamut.

RGBCMY	Saturation	Tint	Luminance
Red	n/a	n/a	n/a
Green	n/a	n/a	n/a
Blue	n/a	n/a	n/a
Cyan	n/a	n/a	n/a
Magenta	n/a	n/a	n/a
Yellow	n/a	n/a	n/a

LG HU80KA Projector Review – Advanced Calibration: CMS Calibration, Calibration Charts

CMS Settings for Best Mode calibration – Expert (Dark Room) Mode

LG HU80KA Expert (Dark Room) Mode Pre-Calibration CIE 1976 Saturation Sweeps (target REC.709)

LG HU80KA Expert (Dark Room) Mode Post-Calibration CIE 1976 Saturation Sweeps (target REC.709)

❮ ❯

RGBCMY	Saturation	Tint	Luminance
Red	17	-12	10
Green	-4	4	4
Blue	-1	-24	7
Cyan	4	-17	7
Magenta	-2	26	5
Yellow	-11	-4	2

Color and CMS performance was again just ok. There are 3 setting options for color gamut (Auto, Wide, Extended) By default it is set to Auto which usually is the closest to REC.709. If you take a look at the pre-calibration color gamut chart you will notice some of the colors look way off target and this is mainly because all of the colors stem from the white point which in this case is quite blue/purple. So, improving the white point with my white balance calibration made big improvements to all the colors.

Once that was done I chose Wide as my color gamut hoping it would help with the red under saturation. Sadly, it had little effect and there were still some lingering problems. Cyan was still running towards blue getting worse at the higher saturation points. Blue was still blowing past its REC.709 100% saturation point. Again, red had the opposite problem with its 100% saturation point just reaching the 80% mark. Through CMS calibration I was able to improve all of these errors a bit except for red still maxing out at 80% saturation and blue being over saturated at 100%.

CMS Settings for Brightest calibration – Standard Mode

LG HU80KA Standard Mode Pre-Calibration CIE 1976 Saturation Sweeps (target REC.709)

LG HU80KA Standard Mode Post-Calibration CIE 1976 Saturation Sweeps (target REC.709)

❮ ❯

RGBCMY	Saturation	Tint	Luminance
Red	n/a	n/a	n/a
Green	n/a	n/a	n/a
Blue	n/a	n/a	n/a
Cyan	n/a	n/a	n/a
Magenta	n/a	n/a	n/a
Yellow	n/a	n/a	n/a

Well there is really not much to say here as there are no CMS controls available in Standard mode. The improvements you do see in the before and after CMS charts come from 2 picture settings, color temp being set from Medium to Warm and color gamut being set from Wide to Auto. Without CMS controls post-calibration color gamut is not good with blue over saturated quite a bit, magenta over saturated and running towards blue. Cyan also running towards blue and red under saturated, running out of gas around the 85% mark.

CMS Settings for 4K HDR – Standard (HDR) Mode

LG HU80KA Standard (HDR) Mode Pre-Calibration P3 Saturation Sweeps inside BT.2020

LG HU80KA Standard (HDR) Mode Post-Calibration P3 Saturation Sweeps inside BT.2020

❮ ❯

Just like with my Brightest Mode calibration there are no CMS controls available in Standard (HDR) mode. The improvements you do see in the before and after CMS charts come from setting the Color Temp from Medium to Warm. Without CMS controls post-calibration P3 color gamut is quite a mess. Red maxes out around 70% saturation but is not very linear with the lower saturation points (20%,40% & 60%) erroring towards magenta while the outer points (80% & 100%) moving towards yellow. Even if I had CMS controls fixing one error would worsen the other. Magenta is pushing towards blue and most likely would be improved with calibration, same with cyan. Other issues cannot be fixed with calibration. Like Red, cyan & green maxed out at 70% saturation and some of their saturation points sitting near or on top of each other, far from their targets. Only Blue and magenta reach 100% P3 color gamut.