Blu-rays with lots of dark scenes?

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maddog1419

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Hi, I just bought a Sharp LC52LE810UN LCD TV and I really want to test it for clouding and see if its something I can live with. Can someone recommend me some blu-rays with lots of dark scenes? Also any blu-rays that just look flat out awesome, I plan to rent Avatar soon. I really don't watch too many movies, so if you recommend it I probably haven't seen it. Just nothing kiddy or disney ish. Thanks!
 
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Sweeney Todd had a shit-ton of dark scenes. If you just want to test black levels, that's probably the go-to disc.

The Dark Knight was also very dark in a number of scenes, and has the work "dark" in its title... and it's a pretty great showcase for Blu-Ray.
 
The Descent.

For clouding, just make a 1920x1080 pixel black image in Paint or Photoshop. Then display it off a thumbdrive. Then you'll have a true black image. Just increase the backlight a on your TV little by little until you start seeing where the clouds are.
 
[quote name='panzerfaust']Kingdom of Heaven (director's cut) is an awesome blu-ray experience :bow:[/QUOTE]

Uhhhh...yeah...but there aren't many dark scenes.
 
Yeah either just awesome movies, or just movies with dark scenes. Awesome movies with a lot of dark scenes would be ftw. I know about the jpeg test, and I can see clouding mostly during loading times in games, I just really want to test movies because I think I'll want to start watching movies on a regular basis now. The clouding isn't terrible so far. I don't notice it while gaming, just when the screen goes entirely black to load something etc. So far I really like the set. Thanks for the recommendations!
 
I second Sin City, plus it's one of the best Blu-rays I've seen for PQ.

If you really want to see how well it picks up black on black, there are some good scenes in The Godfather where they all meet wearing dark suits in a very dim room. Making sure you can pick them up and make sure they don't just bleed into the shade would be a good test.
 
I will jump on the Sin City bandwagon as well. It has alot of dark scenes but it is also just a great movie, if you havent seen it.
 
I recall that the newest Harry Potter movie was super dark pretty much all of the time. I just rented that from Redbox back when it came out. Might be a good movie to use if it's still in Redbox.
 
you really gotta get yourself a DVE (bb or amazon) disc and visit the forums at avs science (prepare to be utterly confused though)..

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Digital...8844272&st=digital video essentials&lp=1&cp=1

as far as I know, clouding isn't something that can be gotten rid of completely; rather, you have to find a level thats bearable. Its how the sets are made, and no 2 sets are the same when they come off the line..seems clouding has to do with how well all the pieces fit together and how tight..the DVE disc helps you with black levels, sharpness and help with the blue color structure. I did it on my TV and noticed a huge difference..
 
Yeah I know that all the led's cloud, and every set is different. I've been reading avsforums for a few months now, and I've seen a few pics of the same model tv I have where the clouding is all over the place. The particular picture I saw was of the Dark Knight, there was a shot of of the city and all four corners had extremely noticeable clouding. My set isn't that bad, I've only used it for games so far and I can only see it during loading screens if the screen goes 90% black. My 23inch monitor does the same thing. That's not a big deal to me, but if I start seeing it while actively playing games or watching movies I'll have to return it. I'm gonna play Alan wake and see if I notice any. I'll also rent a blu-ray tonight, probably Sin City, haven't seen it.
 
hehe, yeah, Alan Wake would be perfect, thats when I first noticed the clouds on my screen after a few hours of just normal TV watching where I didn't really see them..plus mine was all jacked up to you know how when you set brightness in a game and have to get it to where you don't see text in one box? well I saw text in all boxes no matter where I put that slider..but when I turned my backlight down, it got better, but not perfect..
 
Yeah, I put my backlight at standard. The tv pretty much just came out so there aren't really any professional settings I can dial in, but thats a whole nother story lol. I love the tv so far though, playing BFBC2 and GOW3 blew me a way.

Is this what you were talking about? (DVE?)

http://www.amazon.com/Digital-Video...ef=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1277146725&sr=8-1

I'm considering getting it professionally calibrated or just waiting until I see some pro settings. For $20.00 though, can't really go wrong.
 
Hands down a blu to really test out your Black levels on your Tv would be "Aliens Vs. Predator : Requiem" that movie is amazingly dark.
 
Clouding is more evident if you are not watching at the right viewing angle. Yeah, HDTV's advertise shit like 180 degree viewing angles, but that's horizontal more than vertical. Elevation is pretty important. TV's look worse when you put them up high on walls.

Backlight makes clouding evident too. I turn my backlight to zero. Frankly, everytime I calibrated a TV, it only reached the correct values with the backlight off. Turning it on makes getting the right grayscale gradient values (like with a simple 10-step test image) a pain in the ass, especialy when trying to get a nice inky black level.

[quote name='wormraper']Hands down a blu to really test out your Black levels on your Tv would be "Aliens Vs. Predator : Requiem" that movie is amazingly dark.[/QUOTE]

I agree 100%. Holy fuck. With a calibrated TV, you can't see SHIT! I had to create an entirely new picture mode just to watch that movie.
 
While it's still open though: I really wish LED tvs didn't have the issues with clouding that they do. I would LOVE to buy one of the new Samsung LED's, but once I've seen the clouding I just can't "unsee" it. I even tried out one of the LG backlit LED's, which is considered to be one of the best, and I still noticed clouding.

Don't get me wrong, I love the Pioneer KURO I ended up with, but sometimes I would really like the brightness and color pop that some of the new LED televisions have.
 
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So after ripping a certain someones head off in GOW3 you go through some pitch black tunnels and it was clouding galore with the backlight set to standard. Splinter Cell Conviction was pretty bad too. Surprisingly, Alan Wake looked great only noticed it during load screens/when nothing was on screen. It's all on the left half of the tv too, the right side is perfect. I called some local rental places and all the movies I asked for were taken. I'll try again tomorrow. As of right now though, I think the sets going back =(
 
For high picture quality, any of the Pixar animated videos are flat out incredible on Blu Ray. I second 'Blade Runner'. You can find that 5 disc version for real cheap too. The Matrix is quality. The 2nd and 3rd Matrix movies are good picture/ sound quality, just depends how much you like them.

Others, I recommend are:
'Casino Royale'
'Dark Knight'
'Apollo 13'
'Rush: Snakes and Arrows Live' (if you are a fan of their music)


Jason
 
A few movies that haven't been mentioned yet that should give your dark levels a workout: Moon, Shutter Island, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix/Half-Blood Prince, Star Trek 2009 (great juxtaposition of light and dark imagery), Cloverfield, Hellboy II: The Golden Army, Defiance, Sherlock Holmes, Pan's Labyrinth, Terminator Salvation (awful movie, great disc), Ghost Rider (ditto), Let the Right One In (make sure to see the version with the 'Theatrical' subtitles), Watchmen and the 'Caves' episode of Planet Earth.

For the opposite, movies that'll really make the lighter colors work I'd look at Up, WALL-E, Star Trek 2009 (see earlier comment), Quantum of Solace, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (awful movie, great disc), Iron Man, District 9, Avatar, Armageddon and The Last Samurai.
 
I don't know why it hasn't been said yet, but Pandorum is set in a dark ship... A lot of the film is dark, and I'm sure it would be great to test it out on. Film quality, not the best, but in terms of darkness, it's pretty black.
 
[quote name='Vulgarism']I don't know why it hasn't been said yet, but Pandorum is set in a dark ship... A lot of the film is dark, and I'm sure it would be great to test it out on. Film quality, not the best, but in terms of darkness, it's pretty black.[/QUOTE]

Dark movie, but I thought it was a pretty mediocre Blu-Ray. Does remind me, though, that Sunshine is a pretty superb PQ Blu-Ray with a number of dark scenes and dark/light juxtaposition.
 
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