it's not your eyes or the brightness of
your screen this is a very dark episode
of HBO's House of the Dragon on a 650
TCL LCD television
what are we even looking at this is that
same scene on a three thousand dollar
OLED Sony TV
better
kind of at least you can make out this
person in these Blades of grass but
still
HBO's hit show looks like it was
afforded everything but a lamp
entertainment there's a dark TV problem
and HBO's House of the Dragon isn't the
only culprit it just happens to be the
most recent for years viewers have
criticized many of television's biggest
shows for being too hard to see why did
that episode of House the dragon look so
bad
stranger things season 4 too dark I can
barely see it if your intentional
creative decision is that people can't
see the TV show that you're making then
you're making a podcast all right so why
is this happening is it the way the
shows are being filmed is it your TV
settings or is it the TVs themselves
turns out it's a combination of all
those things to better understand why
things appear so dark I gathered a lot
of TVs and recruited Kevin Miller so I'm
a calibrator both for professional
companies post-production facilities in
Manhattan Kevin is serious about TV
display settings he adjusts them some
screens show exactly what the creators
of shows intended I calibrate TVs like
this in people's homes to Kevin it's not
about how the shows are shot it's all
about the TVs what's his argument it's
not the content because the content is
an artistic decision made by the
director hbr responded similarly after
the drift Mark House of the Dragon
episode House of the Dragon showrunner
Ryan Condell pointed figure out the
streaming services themselves for some
of the issues sure but if we can't see
the creators work why even watch
Kevin and other experts I talk to
attribute the poor viewing experience to
technical issues on your TV here's how
you may be able to fix some of them and
at least see some of those darker scenes
the first reason you might be
experiencing issues with those dark
scenes your TV more specifically it's
green OLED has the best black level
reproduction of any display device ever
made and that's because it's it's an
emissive technology a light gets shut
off to create black
look at the difference between a 2200
OLED TV and a 650 LCD with LED backlit
technology both are using default
settings
this of course is an extreme example
meant to demonstrate the difference in
how OLED and LCDs display blacks higher
end LCDs can do a better job than what
you are seeing here
and to be fair the camera can't
reproduce exactly what we saw but if
you're in the market for a new TV and
want to see every shade of black in a
variety of environments it's hard to go
wrong with an OLED just be prepared to
spend more money
but don't worry you don't necessarily
need to buy an expensive new TV do you
have a light switch any ambient light in
a room will obscure Shadow detail in
dark material even a light colored
surface like the wall if it's white will
reflect light from a display the fix is
relatively easy you gotta go into full
Dracula viewing mode and get as close to
creating your own home movie theater as
possible in an interview with deadline
The House of the Dragon showrunner said
the show is calibrated with that sort of
environment in mind
also make sure you're viewing your TV
head on or within about 45 degrees to
either side
then there's picture settings most often
found hidden in one of your TV's sub
menus the first thing you want to find
is the most accurate Best Picture Mode
yes Puris like Kevin will direct you to
TV settings made for film like the Sony
TV custom Dolby Vision picture profile
or filmmaker mode but they will appear
darker if you want to lighten everything
up try looking for bright presets or
using the Vivid profile which is
available on most TVs including Sony LG
and TCL and on Samsung units the dynamic
setting is tuned for brighter more
highly lit viewing environments one of
the many tools Kevin uses to calibrate
requires a Blu-ray player and a special
disc but because this is 2022 and few
people have time for that
you can use a calibration tool on
YouTube though appears like Kevin would
never be caught dead using one no
definitely not nothing against YouTube
find one of these black level tests on
YouTube load it up in full screen and
adjust your brightness or black level
until you can just barely see the box
next to the reference black then lastly
if you're still unsatisfied with how
dark some of these shows are you can try
turning off HDR in my testing the scr
version of House of the Dragon was
considerably brighter and easier to view
on most streaming devices including
Apple TV and Google Chromecast the HDR
toggle is found in the settings menu
so is this issue likely to go away
anytime soon
probably not now that showrunners are
making television shows that feel like
movies they're also giving them the same
cinematic treatment despite the fact
that we're just watching them in our
living rooms fortunately House of the
Dragons season 2 hasn't even begun
filming yet so you've got lots of time
to prepare your TV viewing for next
season