4K TVs at normal distance already exceed the resolution the eye can see.
This seems impressive, but also seemingly pointless.
https://www.cnet.com/news/why-ultra-hd-4k-tvs-are-still-stup...
This seems impressive, but also seemingly pointless.
https://www.cnet.com/news/why-ultra-hd-4k-tvs-are-still-stup...
Separately, though: you're assuming a pretty small (i.e. "regular-sized" TV.) There are a lot of other use-cases for display of broadcast TV signals, though. For example, there might be a 50-inch "wallpaper" TV on the wall of a corridor you're walking through, tuned to a nature channel, serving as a sort of "animated landscape art installation" to decorate the corridor†. 4K @ 50" is only 88DPI! And you'd be walking sometimes only inches away from it (if the hall is crowded.) It'd certainly look pixelated, and so not much like a real "painting" at all. 8K would look a lot closer to "real" in that situation.
† If you're wondering, this is a real thing that most modern "wallpaper" TVs already advertise themselves as being usable for. Most such TVs have screensaver modes that display high-res scans of paintings, embedded in photorealistic "frames", and from even a few feet away, it's a near-perfect illusion.
This is simply mitigating the effects of a poor quality resampling algorithm, not a true advantage of 8K. At common viewing distances, you could get the same visual result on a 4K panel by resampling with a correct anti-aliasing filter.
No, I cannot see the pixel grid of my 55in 4k OLED TV at a viewing distance of more than about a foot. However I can see a single pixel illuminated at about 25ft.
So to say there is not benefit to 8k is like saying we'll never need more than 640k of RAM.
You have an alternative theory of vision where resolution is not limited by photoreceptor density? Look, there are only so many cells on your retina.
> However I can see a single pixel illuminated at about 25ft.
And you can see a star (which subtends a MUCH smaller angular size than that mere pixel) at hundreds of light years. Yet it takes a skyscraper-sized telescope and mindbendingly crazy interferometric and occlusion techniques to detect even the planets in that system, much less the disk of the star itself.
No, this is wrong. Your eyes can't detect the difference between 4k and 8k at routine (i.e. 90 degree width or so) distances. They just can't.
proof please.
PS: Eyes have 120 million rod cells, and 6 million cone cells. Further, those cells are not in a grid pattern. A 4K TV is approximately 8.3 million pixels so it’s approaching the right order of magnitude, but still has some room before you can individually activate each cell.
As such, perhaps it would be better to say that given your understanding of the physiology of the optics of the eye, and the receptors and nerves of the eye, that you believe strongly that it’s not possible to detect the difference between 4k and 8k at some common viewing distance. Or perhaps more simply “most” or “nearly all” people can not detect the difference. As with unusual occurrences like tetrachromats, it could be that there are some people with higher resolution perception such that they could see the difference.
I don’t have a reference now, but I recall from a Feynman writing that there have been experiments to see how few photons a person could perceive. As I understand it, nobody was able to say they saw the photon (or bundle of a few photons), but they were asked to press a button whenever they thought they might have seen a photon. The distribution came back slightly biased towards affirmation that they could see the single or few photons, rather than the distribution mere chance would predict. Nobody could tell you what that photon looked like, and yet somehow they did perceive it x% of the time, where x was something like 10% (or the experiment had a flaw that cued the subject—I don’t know if it’s been repeated).
Now, I’m not suggesting this says anything at all about resolution, it’s about intensity, but it is still it is interesting. And the idea of the study is worth considering for learning about resolution perception.
Perhaps nobody would pass the Pepsi challenge comparing an 8k Mona Lisa to a 4K Mona Lisa at some distance. But if subjects were shown a series of many images and asked to push a button when they would thought it was 8k, maybe would tell us something interesting.
There are lots of things to control for, like a correlation among all the 8k images or 4k images, but I think it could be done. I don’t really know the details of how the hypotheses are constructed for a good study, but if someone has some suggested reading, I’m interested. Perhaps we would say:
* All subjects are shown the same N images
* The image is randomly (normal? uniform?) selected to be the 8k version or 4k version.
* If a version of the image has been shown to the subject, it will not be shown again to that subject in either resolution
* Subjects that have seen the images can not discuss with subjects that have not
And million other thing like the coloring of the images, subject matter, and so on. Maybe have a version that provides feedback on correctness.
Of course with HD vs UHD, we are usually talking about sampling rate, not dynamic range (HDR is a thing though). For downsampling, proper anti-aliasing is needed. One good way to check would be to take the UHD content, blur it and then present it on the same 4k display without changing the resolution. Then do the A/B testing and see what the results are.
If you just downsize to HD, then you will introduce aliasing artifacts, and then more artifacts will be introduced when the TV upscales to 4k again, and it's pretty well known that people can see aliasing artifacts at HD resolution.
Can you distinguish if that pixel is illuminated at column 1279 vs 1278? Or two pixels at (gamma correct) half brightness?
As for the 12" display, ~18" is the proper viewing distance. The proper viewing distance for a 55" TV is about 7-8'. Even for a monster 85" TV the viewing distance is only around 12'. At a viewing distance of 25' the display should be close to 200".
To be honest, I understand the sentiment. Supporting Sony or Sharp means supporting jobs and the domestic economy, and (unlike, say, US automakers) the domestic product is very high quality—just more expensive. Nationalism and protectionism are gross, but a little team spirit is not evil.
So, I could be wrong, but I bet this is a way to move new models out of the showrooms, with the bonus of appealing to the upcoming Olympic broadcast, etc.
Part of it is Olympic pressure to be "first" and show off. We saw this with HDTV in the Atlanta games, with streaming during the Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, and 4K during the Vancouver games. All mediocre tech demos from electronics companies looking to impress a global audience that includes a heavy dose of political and business decision-makers.
But Japan, and especially NHK, has a long history of being a wonderland of tech demos that never go anywhere, or take decades to go mainstream, even at home.
There's something of a "Hey, look what we can do!" ribbon that runs through the culture that is marvelous and charming. There aren't a lot of societies left that, metaphorically, shoot guns at the sun just to see what will happen. (Apologies to A Fine Frenzy)
You're not even mentioning the TV's size. We talking a 60' TV? https://www.noteloop.com/kit/display/pixel-density/ The pixel density at 4K is atrocious on larger panels.
> Healthy young observers may have a binocular acuity superior to 6/6; the limit of acuity in the unaided human eye is around 6/3–6/2.4 (20/10–20/8)
> The significance of the 6/6 standard can best be thought of as the lower limit of normal or as a screening cutoff. When used as a screening test, subjects that reach this level need no further investigation, even though the average visual acuity with a healthy visual system is typically better.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visual_acuity
I myself have been tested (twice) at around 20/8 (and was still better than 20/20 when I was complaining of blurry vision after an eye injury).
I vastly prefer 4k content. It is much, much clearer. There is likely a 4th or 5th variable that isnt considered like the additional pixel count's impact on how the eye sees color etc.
And about every mid to hi-range Android phone that came out in the past 5 years.
I haven't seen the Xr yet but the lower resolution is extremely obvious on the non plus iPhones.
Point I’m making is there is more than just DPI making those new panels look much better. The panel on the XR is the same DPI as the 4 and is widely regarded as one of the best, most colour accurate LCD displays Apple has ever shipped.
The vast majority will not notice the difference between 2x and 3x retina, to borrow apples technical terms for the different densities - beyond a certain point display DPI is a pure bullshit vanity metric for a given size/viewing distance.
For me personally, improvements in screen lamination are some of the biggest differences - on modern iPhones the screen feels directly laminated to the glass - on an old iPhone 4 there is a very noticeable “air gap” between the display and the glass.
Cheap consumer pocket film cameras used to have a pretty crappy quality for a number of reasons.
8K is not pointless, it is a higher number. Higher numbers are better. Would you like to buy some stereo equipment?
I literally cannot read text on a monitor that is less than 4K, it causes me to uncontrollably vomit. I watched a demo of an 8K monitor, and it enabled me to read in languages I don't even speak.
a) helps immerse me in the movie/game, by strengthening the illusion of a "window into another world"
and b) is simply prettier. Most people do like eye candy.
Note that I enjoy my busted 15" CRT quality fine. And to add to this, I really feel that there's a diminishing return in that era, where resolution is ultra high, yet content is not as enjoyable as thing 30 years ago.
I... think you are not in the majority if you think NTSC is "fine"
(Unless you mean a 15" computer monitor, a 15" computer monitors could go rather high resolution, and they are absolutely tiny compared to modern non-portable displays, so the pixel density was kinda okay.)