Epson Home Cinema 5050UB 4K Capable Home Theater Projector Review- Advanced Calibration

Posted on May 30, 2019 by Eric Pfoutz

Epson Home Cinema 5050UB 4K Capable Home Theater Projector Review – Advanced Calibration: CMS Calibration, Calibration Charts

CMS Settings for Best Mode 1080p calibration – Natural

Natural Mode Pre-Calibration CIE 1976 Saturation Sweeps target BT.709

Natural Mode Post Calibration CIE 1976 Saturation Sweeps target BT.709

❮ ❯

RGBCMY	Hue	Saturation	Brightness
Red	48	50	50
Green	47	49	50
Blue	52	50	50
Cyan	48	50	50
Magenta	49	52	49
Yellow	53	48	50

With Color Space set to Auto the projector produced a fairly accurate BT.709 color gamut. Red did exhibit some under saturation across all levels but this is partially due to the default white point being off its target (plus blue). The other colors were quite good with cyan and magenta having some slight hue errors towards blue. After calibration, using the RGBCMY (CMS) controls the color gamut improved into a near perfect BT.709 triangle across all saturation levels, except for red which fell a little short of its 100% saturation target. Overall, I was extremely pleased with the Best Mode calibration using Natural mode.

CMS Settings for Best Mode 4K/HDR – Digital Cinema

Digital Cinema Mode (HDR10 Setting 8) Pre-Calibration P3 Saturation Sweeps inside BT.2020

Digital Cinema Mode (HDR10 Setting 8) Post-Calibration P3 Saturation Sweeps inside BT.2020

❮ ❯

RGBCMY	Hue	Saturation	Brightness
Red	49	50	55
Green	61	50	50
Blue	69	52	50
Cyan	50	48	50
Magenta	80	52	52
Yellow	46	53	50

Like Epson’s previous model (5040UB) the 5050UB does quit well reaching the DCI/P3 color gamut using Digital Cinema mode which employs a color filter. Because the pre-calibration white point is a bit blue it pushes all of the colors in that direction. After performing the 2 & 8-point white balance calibration all 6 colors did improve a bit. After my CMS calibration some of those errors were improved while others were not. Yellow for example exhibits a weird ping-pong effect with 40 & 80IRE moving towards green and 60 & 100IRE moving towards red. All I can do is set them to their best average. Gamut wise the 5050UB performance was exceptional averaging near 100% DCI/P3 coverage. Red was the weakest maxing at 96%. Overall post calibration performance is excellent for HDR/P3.

CMS Settings for Brightest Mode 4K/HDR – Natural

Natural Mode HDR10 Setting 8 Pre-Calibration BT.709 Saturation Sweeps inside BT.2020

Natural Mode HDR10 Setting 8 Post-Calibration BT.709 Saturation Sweeps inside BT.2020

❮ ❯

As expected, the 4K/HDR P3 color accuracy is not as good using Natural mode (no color filter). Red and blue max out at about 90% saturation and surprisingly the rest of the colors do hit or come very close to their 100% targets but it’s their linearity that is problematic as you see in the CMS charts. Also, their luminance levels are all very low (not shown). Calibration does little to fix these errors. What calibration does improve is the hue and brightness levels (to a small extent) but overall there is minimal difference pre & post calibration.