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Heat in 4k/HDR with OS4.2 is very, very dark

C

canyonblue737

macrumors 68020
Original poster
Jan 10, 2005
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Problem with the 4K HDR version of "Heat" with tvOS 4.2 and my Sony X940E tv. I am running in 4k HDR / content matching and frame rate matching ON and the movie in unwatchable because it is so dark. The menu screens are fine but the moment it switches to the film its like putting on a dark pair of sunglasses to watch. Turning off content matching and setting to 4k SDR fixes the issue but leaves me without HDR. Dozens of my other 4k / HDR films are just fine.

Anyone else seeing this? I assume its a mastering mistake with the film since none of my other films are experiencing this problem. I reported it to apple through the system that allows you to report an issue with a purchase but is there anywhere else I can notify them or have someone else confirm the issue with this film, thanks!
 
canyonblue737 said:
Problem with the 4K HDR version of "Heat" with tvOS 4.2 and my Sony X940E tv. I am running in 4k HDR / content matching and frame rate matching ON and the movie in unwatchable because it is so dark. The menu screens are fine but the moment it switches to the film its like putting on a dark pair of sunglasses to watch. Turning off content matching and setting to 4k SDR fixes the issue but leaves me without HDR. Dozens of my other 4k / HDR films are just fine.

Anyone else seeing this? I assume its a mastering mistake with the film since none of my other films are experiencing this problem. I reported it to apple through the system that allows you to report an issue with a purchase but is there anywhere else I can notify them or have someone else confirm the issue with this film, thanks!
Click to expand...

Just to be sure, you're talking about Heat w/ Pacino and Robert De Niro right? I'll check this out tonight at home and see how it looks.

(I didn't even realize this was 4K HDR now!)
 
I bought it last night but haven't watched yet. I'm on an LG B7 OLED, but I'll check it out and report back. I did buy Blade Runner in 4k HDR last night and thought it looked like garbage. I get that it was shot on film so you get film grain (which is nice), but it looks like watching a movie where every frame was printed on a dot matrix printer. Anyone else noticing that?
 
Yep, Heat with Al Pacino and Deniro.

And just to confirm you are running 4k HDR, content matching and frame rate matching on, and tvOS 11.2?

Just checking as oddly this is the only 4k HDR movie that is a problem for me everything else works brilliantly with my Sony XBR75X940E.

Apple wrote back that their quality control team will check the movie and they refunded my cost for it and let me keep it! Hope it’s fixed soon or O figure out, I haven’t checked since yesterday maybe they already changed something... I honestly believe the issue has something to do with the tagging that tells the AppleTV how to set itself for the film and that’s on their end...
 
ninethirty said:
I bought it last night but haven't watched yet. I'm on an LG B7 OLED, but I'll check it out and report back. I did buy Blade Runner in 4k HDR last night and thought it looked like garbage. I get that it was shot on film so you get film grain (which is nice), but it looks like watching a movie where every frame was printed on a dot matrix printer. Anyone else noticing that?
Click to expand...

Really? I have the LG, what mode are you using? I generally watch most things on Vivid because I find the other modes too dark and I thought for streamed 4k Blade Runner looked great.
 
@canyonblue737

It's not just you. I noticed the same thing a couple nights ago and actually came on this forum to check if anyone had the same problem too. I think you're right about the tagging especially since we have different TVs, but the same problem. Mine is an LG OLED65E6P. All of my other movies in HDR or DV play fine.
 
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If you are affected you would know, for example the cafe seen where Pacino and Deniro talk is not just dark, it’s unwatchable it is so dark, you couldn’t miss it. It’s like wearing sunglasses in a dark room. Something is messed up on the tagging and causes issues with certain sets. I reported it and Apple did say they forwarded it to the department that looks at such issues, hopefully they do. Thanks everyone.
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StarPlatinum said:
@canyonblue737

It's not just you. I noticed the same thing a couple nights ago and actually came on this forum to check if anyone had the same problem too. I think you're right about the tagging especially since we have different TVs, but the same problem. Mine is an LG OLED65E6P. All of my other movies in HDR or DV play fine.
Click to expand...
Please report this at Apple’s “report a problem” iTunes page. Thanks!
 
Watched some of Heat last night and everything looked good to me with the HDR. Matching Frame rate & content...all good.

Hope everything can get sorted with your set-up!!
 
I have the same problems using a different TV. With all the lights out at night, in vivid mode it’s still not wtachable!
 
Put the Apple TV is SDR mode with content match enabled. BTW I remember seeing heat in the theater.... the film was mostly night scenes
 
This doesn't apply to the OP however for people that stumble through. More often than not when luminance is measured across the screens entirety HDR will but "darker" because people use too high of a brightness setting before and not even noticing the massive amounts of clipping (1st reason its dark).

Here is an example, the HDR on the left is darker...but only where it helps. You couldn't even see there was a mountain back there before.

Screen Shot 2020-08-30 at 5.50.52 AM.png


However the main reason people turn on HDR say...its too dark and washed out and then turn it back off is because they switch color spaces (SDR Rec 709 to HDR Rec 2020) but didn't bother to adjust the TV settings for the color space and dynamic range. Here is why you need to do that....

Screen Shot 2020-08-30 at 6.20.45 AM.png


Not representative of perceived brightness but thats 100x higher range for brightness of brightness for HDR. If you limit the peak brightness to the SDR range its going to be very dark. (2nd reason its dark)
 
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cynics said:
This doesn't apply to the OP however for people that stumble through. More often than not when luminance is measured across the screens entirety HDR will but "darker" because people use too high of a brightness setting before and not even noticing the massive amounts of clipping (1st reason its dark).
Click to expand...

Ugh. I don't know why TV manufacturers do such an unbelievably poor job at sensible defaults for each colour space.

My LG OLED is as close to sensible as I've seen. Reasonable 'reference' ISF profiles which make a good base for adjustment according to preference and lighting conditions. But it took a hell of a lot of setup time to get everything just right for every source.

I'd love to see a setup process where it shows an image that's representative of each supported colourspace (like your demo pictures) and lets the user adjust a bit brighter/darker to preference, with the TV doing what it needs to do to meet that without clipping. Perhaps offer a bit of guidance like, 'increase/decrease brightness to preference, making sure you can still see the detail in 'x' part of the image'.

Keep the expert options, of course -- but almost every modern TV is set up horribly, which is such a shame given how good even an average new TV is these days.

(...and of course, any smoothing or de-judder which causes the Soap Opera Effect should be disabled with extreme prejudice)
 
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canyonblue737 said:
Problem with the 4K HDR version of "Heat" with tvOS 4.2 and my Sony X940E tv. I am running in 4k HDR / content matching and frame rate matching ON and the movie in unwatchable because it is so dark. The menu screens are fine but the moment it switches to the film its like putting on a dark pair of sunglasses to watch. Turning off content matching and setting to 4k SDR fixes the issue but leaves me without HDR. Dozens of my other 4k / HDR films are just fine.

Anyone else seeing this? I assume its a mastering mistake with the film since none of my other films are experiencing this problem. I reported it to apple through the system that allows you to report an issue with a purchase but is there anywhere else I can notify them or have someone else confirm the issue with this film, thanks!
Click to expand...
I just made an account here just to comment on this. No you’re not wrong, it looks completely wrong, super dark, on my TV (LG C7 and Apple TV 4K with both dynamic and frame rate set to match) and iPhone 12 Pro Max. People can just check it on their iPhone, looks terrible, I never actually watched the movie since buying it years ago, I’d rather watch it on VHS!

Update: I tried what someone in this thread suggested, turned off match dynamic range, and set the output to 4K SDR 24 FPS, and the picture it totally fine!
 
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