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Epson Home Cinema 3700 Projector – Calibration & Settings

Posted on February 28, 2017 By Art Feierman

EPSON HOME CINEMA 3700 PROJECTOR: CALIBRATION SETTINGS and POST CALIBRATION MEASUREMENTS

 

Epson Home Cinema 3700 Calibration Presets notes

Eric’s notes:

I preformed 2 calibrations on the 3700, one for a dark room using Cinema mode (medium lamp) and a brighter day mode using Bright Cinema (bright lamp). Overall calibration went as expected, except there was one issue I observed with the color red when calibrating it using the projectors CMS controls. We normally calibrate the 6 colors using 100% saturation test patterns and try to put the colors at their correct (REC 709) x y coordinates and at their proper 100% luminance levels.

If you look at either the before or after CIE charts you will see 100% red (outer dot) is a little under saturated and pushing towards yellow/green, while 80, 60, 40 & 20% are all over saturated and pulling towards magenta/blue. As I tried to move 100% red to its x y (box) it caused 80, 60, 40 & 20% to all move even further towards magenta/blue turning red more to pink. So, 100% red was slightly orange and 80 and below was pinkish. Now most of the content we watch is not at 100% levels so I only made a small adjustment to red, otherwise skin tones would become too pink. I hoping this issue is only with this 3700 sample.

I was able to achieve outstanding white balance and near perfect 2.40 gamma curve in Cinema mode. Bright Cinema is designed of course to be bright and one way they achieve this is to have a very bright gamma curve, 1.56 in this case. As I tried to lower the gamma to my target of 2.10 it lowered the peak white down too much, similar to what we got out of Cinema Mode thus losing any benefit of a brighter mode. So, I only lowered the gamma to 1.87 to keep the overall light output up.

Lumen Output and Color Temp at 100 IRE (mid zoom and Medium lamp):
Dynamic 3119@6704K
Bright Cinema 2286@7039K
Natural 2008@6918K
Cinema 2052@6505K

 

Lumen Output and Color Temp at 100 IRE Dynamic Mode (mid zoom and Eco lamp):
2128@6702K
This equates to a 32% drop off in lumen output vs high bulb.
(3119 high vs 2128 low)

 

This chart is repeated from the Performance page

 Pre-Calibration (Various Modes) – Color Temp over IRE range
Cinema Mode (Med. Lamp, Mid Zoom) Bright Cinema Mode (Bright Lamp, Mid Zoom)
30 IRE 6729K 6887K
50 IRE 6860K 6943K
80 IRE 6978K 7057K
100 IRE 6918K 7039K
Average Gamma = 2.37 Average Gamma = 1.60
 

Epson HC3700 Pre- and Post-Calibration Settings and Image Enhancement, By Mode

Cinema Mode

Epson HC3700 Pre- and Post-Calibration for Cinema Mode (Medium Lamp & Mid Zoom)
Pre-Calibration Post-Calibration
Color Temp 5 (1-10)  5 (1-10)
Skin Tone 3 (1-10) 3 (1-10)
Gamma 0 -1
Super White Off Off
Contrast 50 48
Brightness 50 50
Color 50 50
Tint 50 53
Auto Iris High Speed High Speed
Sharpness (standard) 5 5
Thin Line / Thick Line 5  /  5 5  /  5

 

Epson HC3700 Pre- and Post-Cal Image Enhancement for Cinema Mode
Pre-cal Image Enhancement Post-cal Image Enhancement
Image Preset Mode 2 (1-5) 2 (1-5)
Noise Reduction 1 (1-3) 0 (1-3)
Mpeg Noise Reduction 1 (1-3) 0 (1-3)
Super Resolution – Fine Line 2 (1-20) 12 (1-20)
Super Resolution – Soft Focus Detail 2 (1-20) 12 (1-20)
Detail Enhancement 20 (1-100) 20 (1-100)

Bright Cinema Mode:

Epson HC3700 Pre- and Post-Calibration for Bright Cinema Mode
Pre-Calibration Post-Calibration
Color Temp 5 (1-10)  4 (1-10)
Skin Tone 3 (1-10)  3 (1-10)
Gamma 0  -2
Super White Off Off
Contrast 50  50
Brightness 50  50
Color 50 50
Tint 50 53
Auto Iris High Speed High Speed
Sharpness (standard) 5 5
Thin Line / Thick Line 5  /  5 5  /  5
Epson HC3700 Pre- and Post-Cal Image Enhancement for Bright Cinema Mode
Pre-cal Image Enhancement Post-cal Image Enhancement
Image Preset Mode 3 (1-5) 2 (1-5)
Noise Reduction 7 (1-3) 0 (1-3)
Mpeg Noise Reduction 1 (1-3) 0 (1-3)
Super Resolution – Fine Line 5 (1-20)  12 (1-20)
Super Resolution – Soft Focus Detail 5 (1-20) 12 (1-20)
Detail Enhancement 30 (1-100) 20 (1-100)

Grayscale Calibration (RGB Balance)

HC3700 Custom Custom color temp w/ 5 starting point
Gain Red = 39
Green = 51
Blue = 48
Offset Red = 49
Green = 50
Blue = 50

 

HC3700 Bright Cinema Mode Custom color temp w/ 4 starting point
Gain Red = 41
Green = 50
Blue = 42
Bias Red = 50
Green = 52
Blue = 51

HC3700 Cinema Mode Pre-Calibration Charts

Epson HC3700 Bright Cinema Mode Pre-Calibration Charts

Post-Calibration Color Temperature

Color Temp over IRE Range (Post Calibration)
IRE Cinema Mode Bright Cinema
10 6798K 7571K
20 6610K 6335K
30 6388K 6332K
40 6439K 6354K
50 6437K 6421K
60 6508K 6471K
70 6466K 6494K
80 6465K 6516K
90 6507K 6495K
100
(White)		 6449K & 1944 Lumens 6507K & 2231 Lumens
Average Gamma = 2.37 (target 2.40) Average Gamma = 1.87 (target 2.10)
Epson Home Cinema 3700 Projector Review – Performance
Epson Home Cinema 3700 – Advanced Calibration