STACK #223 May 2023

TECH FEATURE

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TIPS TRADE OF THE Q&A

We asked Richard Falzon,TCL product manager for Australia & New Zealand, for some professional advice on how to get the best from a smart TV.

Should you fiddle with brightness, contrast and colour settings? TCL’s latest AI picture calibration works very well, so combined with the correct picture mode, the settings will adapt to the content to optimise quality, ensuring brightness, contrast, and colour are accurately reproduced. It also knows when faces are on the screen, and ensures they are always clear. Models with a light sensor will smoothly adapt the picture according to

Should you enable all the auto settings, or turn some off? Depending on the content being watched, many of the calibration settings can be left as they are. Some examples are: Motion Clarity is generally defaulted to 'ON' at the maximum setting. For most users this is fine, as it ensures a smooth picture. But when this function is off, you’ll notice jitter when the credits roll. Motion clarity smooths this out. Clarity Settings – The big one here is Noise Reduction, which improves poor picture quality. This is generally set to 'AUTO' so the TV will adjust accordingly, and doesn’t need to be touched. These settings are best left to factory default. Brightness – Depending on the model, you’ll also find settings relating to Local Dimming, Dynamic Contrast, Black Level and Dynamic Brightness. The default settings don’t need to be adjusted, but if you choose to, adjust the level of backlight brightness (to achieve maximum brightness), or run the TV in Eco Mode to save power and make the picture easy on the eyes. Again, trust the default and auto calibration settings to get the picture you want. Or you can dive in and customise every aspect – RGB, White Balance, and Colour Space settings. Depending on the content, DolbyVision can sometimes make a picture look dark.What's the best fix? With Dolby Vision, I feel brightness has improved with the newer generation of TVs. You are limited in what settings you can adjust, as the TV is calibrated to Dolby parameters, but you still have the ability to increase the black level and contrast settings. You also have default “Dolby Vision Bright” and “Dolby Vision Dark” settings. TVs with light sensors also offer Dolby Vision IQ, which adapts to your surroundings for the ultimate HDR experience.

What are some common mistakes made when setting up a smart TV?

RF: Generally, the out-of-box settings in TVs today are

very good and deliver a great picture, but some may think the picture is a little dark (especially in a well-lit room). The easiest fix is to change the Picture Mode setting to “Vivid” or “Smart HDR”. This will make the TV instantly pop. Conversely, if you find the picture too bright, or have limited control over picture settings/other functions, the TV may be set to 'Store' mode instead of 'Home' mode. Simply change the location to Home in the settings. And when auto-tuning channels, always check the location is set to Australia. What are the best picture mode settings for particular content? Everyone has their own idea of how they like to watch their content, but picture modes are a one-stop place to quickly get the picture the way you want it to look. For news and network TV shows, the default Low Power mode should be sufficient. There’s more than enough brightness, and saturation is set mid scale, so skin tones are natural. Movie mode will soften up the picture and give it a warmer look, while Sports mode optimises motion and colour to make you feel like you’re at the stadium. Then there's Game mode, which will limit how the picture is processed, to optimise performance and minimise latency. This means the response for gaming is super fast. It’s also important to note that Auto Low Latency Mode will automatically put the TV in game mode when a console starts to play a game.

the ambient light of the room. Once these functions are set, you won’t need to touch these again. However, if you want to take the calibration to the next level – a warmer picture, higher contrast, or deeper blacks – it’s simple to tweak these settings. Using the picture preset as a base setting, slightly adjust contrast, saturation, black level, etc. Depending on the model, the level of picture smoothing/motion can also be controlled, or disabled to simulate the cinema experience.

16 MAY 2023

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