Graphics Card/Video Settings

[davegee]

While following Bert's thread on "Making MP4 in PTE" some interesting observations emerged which might be useful to some.

Igor reminded me that the way that colours are represented on a display/monitor in various programmes and the way that the colours and brightness of a Video are represented when using a Video Player can vary according to the Graphics Card Settings.

I can only use the nVidia Control Panel as an example.

In the VIDEO section of the nVidia Control Panel we are offered the options of controlling the Colours and Brightness of Video in a Video Player using nVidia settings or by allowing the Video Player settings to be applied.

I found that letting the Video Player control the colour gave best results in my case on my PC but then a different "problem" arose. By default, the MPC-HC Video Player "maps" the colours/brightness in the following manner:

0-255 are mapped to 16-235.

The result of this is that the area surrounding the Video (if it is not full screen) is dark gray rather than black.

In order to cure this I had to right click on the MPC-HC Window and choose "Shaders/Select Shaders".

I chose the setting - 16-235 to 0-255 [sD][HD] and clicked on "Add to Pre-Resize". By having a video active in the player while doing this and by clicking on "Apply" it is possible to see the effect of this setting immediately.

In my case the dark gray area around the image was immediately turned to pure black and lighter tones were brighter (less muddy).

The conclusion I draw is that it is possible to see differences between an EXE and an MP4 from the same project because of Graphics Card/Video settings AND the settings of the Video Player used to play the MP4.

This poses a question: Is the submission of an MP4 to a competition etc (rather than an EXE) the best possible scenario?

If ALL submissions to the same Show/Competition are viewed the same way i.e. EXE or MP4 then all entrants are "in the same boat" but if some are EXEs and some are MP4s then entrants are "at the mercy" of the person(s) running the Show/Competition to properly set up their equipment. In another thread we have already seen that the volume levels can differ between EXE and MP4 because of the "additional volume control" introduced when MP4 via a Media Player is used.

A judge (or a viewer) could easily and rightly see differences between an EXE and an MP4 which do not arise out of the author's actions but rather out of the inadequate setup of the equipment.

Are these differences too small to worry about? You be the Judge.

DG

P.S. I have, so far, been unable to find the equivalent of the "Shaders" control in Windows Media Player and the result is that whilst I am able to get a pure black background in the MPC-HC Player, the same does not seem to be possible in Windows Media Player. If anyone has a solution I would be pleased to hear from them?