SpectraCal, Inc. announced support for High Dynamic Range standard HDR-10 in a new version of its flagship monitor calibration software CalMAN today. CalMAN Version 5.6.1 creates the HDR-10 metadata information to test, measure, and calibrate currently shipping HDR-10 televisions.
SpectraCal is showing a pre-release version of CalMAN 5.6.1 at the Content and Communications World Expo (CCW) in Javits Center in New York City November 11 and 12.
Previous versions of CalMAN already fully supported Dolby Vision, the first shipping HDR standard, and SpectraCal has also announced that it is working to add support for the HLG version of HDR proposed by the BBC and NHK.
“We thought HDR-10 support would be a long time coming because of the abstruse signaling requirements to support HDR-10 metadata over HDMI,” said SpectraCal’s Head Color Scientist Stacey Spears.
But, according to Spears, exceptionally rapid and effective collaboration with hardware partners Quantum Data and AstroDesign allowed SpectraCal to implement HDR-10 metadata support more quickly than anticipated.
“You can use a Quantum Data 780 or AstroDesign VG-877 to send HDR-10 metadata from CalMAN 5.6.1 today,” said Spears.
With SpectraCal already providing the SpectraCal C6-HDR HDR-certified colorimeter, the pattern generation support announced in CalMAN 5.6.1 provides the final piece of the puzzle.
SpectraCal’s Founder and CTO Derek Smith noted:
HDR is the most exciting advance in display picture quality since the introduction of HDTV. But the additional specifications and advanced performance characteristics make it more difficult and time consuming to analyze and calibrate displays
Compatible with nearly every colorimeter and test pattern generator used in the industry, CalMAN allows technicians at all technical levels to quickly and simply analyze displays. With just a click of a button one can rapidly measure nearly limitless data points to benchmark display samples or determine how closely a reference monitor is functioning to industry standards.With the advanced capabilities of HDR displays comes a need for even more advanced calibration process, and part of that process is utilizing 3D Look-Up Tables, or LUTs. Before CalMAN, tuning these LUTS was a complicated and time-consuming process. CalMAN 5.6 adds the ability to directly communicate and load 3D LUTs–which greatly speeds up the process–to even more outboard processors, software programs and built-in graphics processors in reference monitors than ever before, all without intermediary software.
“3D LUTs are the new standard for reference display calibration,” noted Smith. “3D LUTs are the best way to improve picture quality, and SpectraCal’s CalMAN is the easiest solution to create and load a 3D LUT.”
