2024-04-01, 00:07
Hi Everyone,
tl;dr I can't seem to get HDR content to display properly if using limited range on TV, can't get standard content to display properly if using Full Range on TV. Not sure where the issue is.
I'm running LibreELEC on a Raspberry Pi 5 which is being served media from an UNRAID server I have got going.
It's hooked up to a Hisense U6K, which I must say has excellent format support - Dolby Vision, HDR10+ etc. I have dialled in the video settings as best I can and I must say I was getting great picture quality from all my "traditional" media. One thing that did stump me was setting the HDMI range. There is a setting in Kodi to use either limited or full range. On the TV, there is also an option to set whether Limited or Full Range is being sent by the source device, as well as an "Auto" setting (which I will ignore for this post since this just seems to default to Limited anyway).
For clarity: when I say Kodi is in "Limited" mode, I mean that the setting "Use Limited Color Range (16-235)" under Display settings is set to ON (the little slider button is moved to the right). Vice Versa, when Kodi is in "Full" the setting is set to OFF / button is moved to the left.
For the longest time I had left the setting as Limited in Kodi, limited on the TV. As long as they match, it should work, at least that's what I thought based on my expereince with this same issue with watching media on PC's back in the day. Plus, it's a TV, the setting specifically says to use it when using a TV and not a monitor.
Now that HDR content is becoming a thing I have started building a Library which for the first time includes some HDR stuff. I started noticing that the HDR content appeared much darker, to the point that dark / night time scenes where so dark that you couldn't make out any detail.
This puzzled me for some time until I switched the TV's HDMI range to Full. This solved the issue almost immediately and was a night and day difference - suddenly I could see all the detail I had been missing. The problem was, that normal, non-HDR content now appeared brightened and washed out, so one step forward, one step back.
So, the variables I have noticed when changing the settings:
HDR content goes between Dark and Normal (I used a dark scene from the latest episode of Shogun to test this. I have verified its intended brightness against the original Disney+ stream).
Standard content goes between normal and brightened (I used the opening scene of episode 1 of Mr. Robot, since it has a black opening title card with white text. When it is "brightened" the black turns to grey and there is noticeable unnatural greyness/brightness to all scenes).
The GUI also changes in "brightness" level, although I think the best way to describe this is that its as if a layer of grey fog is added or taken away from the GUI whenever a setting is changed. I have described this as best I can below.
I have tested the different combinations of ranges with both types of content, results below:
TV: Limited
Kodi: Limited
GUI is brightened (one layer), HDR content is Dark, normal content looks normal.
TV: Limited
Kodi: Full
Gui looks the most natural... deepest blue colors from Estuary. HDR content is dark, normal content is normal.
TV: Full
Kodi: Full
GUI is brightened (one layer), HDR content looks normal, standard content is brightened.
TV: Full
Kodi: Limited
Gui is exceptionally brightened (two layers), HDR content looks normal, Standard content is brightened.
I cannot be sure if this is an issue with the TV itself, Kodi, LibreELEC or something unique about the Raspberry Pi (maybe specifically the Pi 5) itself, so I thought of posting here first, but I'm happy to take this issue to the LibreELEC forums if this is perhaps a LibreELEC issue?
I can test on my PC monitor to remove the TV as a variable, but the issue is that the Monitor is not HDR capable, so this would not be an apples-to-apples comparison as Kodi would be tone-mapping the HDR content anyway (at least, that's what I think it would do).
Any help in troubleshooting this issue would be greatly appreciated.
tl;dr I can't seem to get HDR content to display properly if using limited range on TV, can't get standard content to display properly if using Full Range on TV. Not sure where the issue is.
I'm running LibreELEC on a Raspberry Pi 5 which is being served media from an UNRAID server I have got going.
It's hooked up to a Hisense U6K, which I must say has excellent format support - Dolby Vision, HDR10+ etc. I have dialled in the video settings as best I can and I must say I was getting great picture quality from all my "traditional" media. One thing that did stump me was setting the HDMI range. There is a setting in Kodi to use either limited or full range. On the TV, there is also an option to set whether Limited or Full Range is being sent by the source device, as well as an "Auto" setting (which I will ignore for this post since this just seems to default to Limited anyway).
For clarity: when I say Kodi is in "Limited" mode, I mean that the setting "Use Limited Color Range (16-235)" under Display settings is set to ON (the little slider button is moved to the right). Vice Versa, when Kodi is in "Full" the setting is set to OFF / button is moved to the left.
For the longest time I had left the setting as Limited in Kodi, limited on the TV. As long as they match, it should work, at least that's what I thought based on my expereince with this same issue with watching media on PC's back in the day. Plus, it's a TV, the setting specifically says to use it when using a TV and not a monitor.
Now that HDR content is becoming a thing I have started building a Library which for the first time includes some HDR stuff. I started noticing that the HDR content appeared much darker, to the point that dark / night time scenes where so dark that you couldn't make out any detail.
This puzzled me for some time until I switched the TV's HDMI range to Full. This solved the issue almost immediately and was a night and day difference - suddenly I could see all the detail I had been missing. The problem was, that normal, non-HDR content now appeared brightened and washed out, so one step forward, one step back.
So, the variables I have noticed when changing the settings:
HDR content goes between Dark and Normal (I used a dark scene from the latest episode of Shogun to test this. I have verified its intended brightness against the original Disney+ stream).
Standard content goes between normal and brightened (I used the opening scene of episode 1 of Mr. Robot, since it has a black opening title card with white text. When it is "brightened" the black turns to grey and there is noticeable unnatural greyness/brightness to all scenes).
The GUI also changes in "brightness" level, although I think the best way to describe this is that its as if a layer of grey fog is added or taken away from the GUI whenever a setting is changed. I have described this as best I can below.
I have tested the different combinations of ranges with both types of content, results below:
TV: Limited
Kodi: Limited
GUI is brightened (one layer), HDR content is Dark, normal content looks normal.
TV: Limited
Kodi: Full
Gui looks the most natural... deepest blue colors from Estuary. HDR content is dark, normal content is normal.
TV: Full
Kodi: Full
GUI is brightened (one layer), HDR content looks normal, standard content is brightened.
TV: Full
Kodi: Limited
Gui is exceptionally brightened (two layers), HDR content looks normal, Standard content is brightened.
I cannot be sure if this is an issue with the TV itself, Kodi, LibreELEC or something unique about the Raspberry Pi (maybe specifically the Pi 5) itself, so I thought of posting here first, but I'm happy to take this issue to the LibreELEC forums if this is perhaps a LibreELEC issue?
I can test on my PC monitor to remove the TV as a variable, but the issue is that the Monitor is not HDR capable, so this would not be an apples-to-apples comparison as Kodi would be tone-mapping the HDR content anyway (at least, that's what I think it would do).
Any help in troubleshooting this issue would be greatly appreciated.
