Note: according to the article the monitor is actually UHDTV (3840x2160), not 4K (4096x2160). Content encoded at 4K will need to be either cropped or scaled down, similar to 1080p content shown on a 1240x1024 monitor.
With its 32-inch class (31.5-inch diagonal) screen size, 3840 by 2160 Ultra-HD resolution...
You and I can be bitter about it all we want, but there's no point.
Edit: Not only that, but they can (defendably) make the claim that 4k is "4 times the size of 1080p" while (deniably) knowing that some people will misinterpret.
"Megapixels" already exists as an entrenched concept, and I don't think it's deceptive to call 4K 4x larger than 1080p or 8K 16x larger than 1080p.
1080 = 1080 vertical pixels
4k = 4000 = 4000 vertical pixels? Nope.
Shit's confusing. 2k or 4x would be less confusing.
The 4k confusion comes from the decision to simply double 1080p for consumer equipment instead of going the route cinema is going with true 4k horizontal resolution and still co-opt the easy 4k name.
And really, who wants to walk around saying 2160p? Makes me want to follow up with "1.21 gigawatts!"
I do agree with a statement in an article posted here about 4k a few days back. At this point the cinema guys should toss in the towel and just use the term 4K PRO and let consumer equipment use 4k.
Every pixel on a 1920x1080 display is replaced by four pixels on a 4K display so I'm not sure a "4 times the detail" type statement is particularly wrong or misleading. It just doesn't derive from 4000 = 4 x 1080 type logic.
How about "informing other potential consumers" as a point? I certainly appreciated his comment.
I really hate this logic. 16:9 is a horrible format for displays - 90% of the usage of a work monitor (which is what this is targeted towards).
Sure 4K (UHD) is exciting, but I'm really hoping for the 16:10 or taller formats.
A "proper" 4K film shown at DCI resolution is cropped by removing lines due to the combination of aspect ratio between film and projector. The trend in film photography, however, is towards the DCI standard; the RED EPIC shoots at DCI 4K while its predecessor, RED ONE, shoots more lines (I cannot recall off the top of my head, but it is definitely larger than DCI because it didn't fit in my Media Composer DCI workspace the first time I worked with it; I'm really reaching in long-term memory so I might be wrong about this).
All of that, however, is in the cinema world. Since NHK demonstrated 4K TV a couple years ago, everybody in the consumer electronics world has understood 4K to mean 4x 1080p, arranged 2x2, and that is what ITU standardized in recommendation 2020. That's intentional.
It's much easier to evolve 1080p equipment to 4K TV than cinema 4K; it's multiplicative and most of the same equipment can be overhauled. Other resolutions affect aspect ratio, and lenses are a significant portion of the expense of a television camera. You're going to have a hard time selling a standard that makes everybody buy lenses again. Don't forget that everybody just did to go HD. (The last lens I shot on in news was $20,000 by itself, which is part of the reason the average photog will get really mad at you if you grab it, as people who don't want to be videotaped are wont to do.)
If a consumer is buying 4K equipment, its resolution is 3840x2160. This will also be the resolution at which 4K content targeting consumers should be encoded, so I'm not sure what cropping you are referring to. If a DP is buying 4K equipment, its resolution is higher. This isn't marketing droids winning, it's completely different industries having a different history of resolutions: DCI 4K builds upon DCI 2K as 4K builds upon 2K builds upon 1080p; cinema has always fought for 16:10 while consumer electronics stubbornly fight for 16:9, as well.
Wikipedia doesn't help this situation by blurring the history of the two, leading to comments such as this one. Cinema 4K and consumer 4K are not in competition with each other, and there was never a chance of 4K content coming out of the camera at 4096x2560 and making it to a consumer display. They're for different purposes. It's also worth noting that ATSC v3 is still in early stages and is not finalized, which will dictate the broadcast of OTA 4K TV content and pull the industry accordingly.
I am aware some 4K monitors have been released to market at cinema resolution. Those are targeted toward film editors and as monitors for shoot work. There's also some other crazy markets; an engineer I worked with in television installed a bunch of early 4K monitors, the ~$20k ones, in an air traffic control tower. They like the resolution because screens get busy, he said. I don't know if that's true, I merely remember the story.
My comment up-thread discusses why television shifting to 16:10 is unlikely, and it mainly has to do with lenses. Another concern is all of the monitors in studios, trucks, and so forth that are 16:9. Given that, it seems fair to me to have computing move toward 16:9 so the toolchains can be shared between computer monitors and televisions. My 55" 1080p TV was $2,000 when I bought it. You can now buy it under $1,000. What's wrong with taking that experience and working on computer monitors?
Computers are increasingly being used to deliver television and cinema content, as well. It's fairly ideal for me right now to consume 1080p content at its native resolution with no boxing or cropping.
It's not lenses as much as sensors. Most lenses have a circular image circle, which can cover a lot of aspect ratios. (The big exception is anamorphic, but I'm not too familiar with that.) Canon's new HD video lens system, for example, can be stuck on cameras with Super 35 sensors, or standard 3:2 photography 35mm film.
I'm not an expert on the mechanics of how a lens works; I merely know enough to operate the camera and shoot a decent scene, and part of that is lens selection. If you can operate a 16:10 sensor behind, say, a HA18x7.6BERD with square pixels and no distortion or image loss, I stand corrected, but I don't think that's the case from my experience. Again, though, I just pushed buttons (in a single industry application of "transmit picture through lens and apply to persistent storage", television ENG/production), and I didn't take gear apart.
I know there are lenses today that can operate at 4:3 and 16:9. Maybe the same concept?
Grabbing the lens is effective at dissuasion? Good to know.
If you touch a photog or their camera, you're in for bad news. Don't forget they have it on tape...
So I think your comment would be better phrased as a complaint against misuse of the term rather than as a note of explanation is what I'm trying to say.
Apologies if there are a large number of people who would be confused and this is a useful note though.
4096x2160 is fine for expensive cameras because it is designed to be cropped to 3840x2160, but I doubt there will ever be consumer content made in that format.
Your hyperbole is dishonest.
"Your new '4K' TV isn't true 4K"
http://www.avsforum.com/a/the-not-so-subtle-distinction-betw...