Correct HDR settings

HDR
1

I’ve just used SK HDR for the first time, and I’m not sure about some of the settings.

So the only thing I changed in the HDR calibration was the max brightness to what it was set to automatically (I have an LG G5 TV, for which it was I think 2485cd/m2. Is there a way to have this set again to that automatic value? Because I changed the max luminance value in the calibration (display profiling) and now it stays at that set value and I can’t remember for sure what the initial value was). Is that correct? In game (tried it with F.E.A.R.), everything seems very bright now, is that correct like that? Also, is there a way to adjust the UI/HUD brightness? Because that is at max brightness.

2

sk’s hdr calibration widget has a reset button. there’s also an sk wiki page with suggestions for sk’s hdr retrofit etc:

beyond that, you could also ask questions in the the special k discord. there’s an hdr channel there also

but, no, you cannot individually adjust the game’s ui/hud brightness with sk. you probably have the brightness set too high…

3

What do you mean by the brightness too high?

I wanted the maximum available brightness (as in, the max HDR luminance the display supports) - why wouldn’t you - and the hud is at that maximum brightness, which is very uncomfortable too look at.

4

well you said that everything seems very bright now…

and no you don’t want the maximum brightness available from the g5; at least that’s generally not recommend for sk’s hdr retrofit / inverse tonemapping hdr. you generally only want those really high peak max luminance in native hdr games. sk’s hdr retrofit enables hdr, but it’s not native hdr. sk’s enabling hdr (so the monitor does need to support hdr), but it’s basically doing the best it can with an sdr image. if you push the peak to max, you are going to raise the average luminance and the entire scene will be unnaturally bright… you cannot lower the brightness of only the game’s hud with sk.

also, as the sk wiki mentions, setting the brightness scale slider to a fraction of the max brightness value is suggested to prevent brightness from frequently being reduced when using a display with an automatic brightness limiter (ABL).

Anyway, i generally recommend profiling display capabilities with sk and/or using preset 0 or 1; those two are conservatively set for lg oled tvs. the difference between preset 0 and preset 1 is that preset 1 has a slightly higher black level, which may give more shadow detail, but a lot of people want darker black and so preset 0 is the default…

after picking the preset, you could adjust the brightness slider and gamma expansion slider if you want. i believe that’s often enough for people. though you can still manually tweak other sliders if you want (and in some cases you may need to change sk’s EOTF option; some games may look extremely dark unless the EOFT option is changed)

beyond that, you could also try sk’s hdr pipeline remastering options. those options can result in seeing more details and/or result in color banding reduction (hdr isn’t just about a brighter image or just brighter highlights…)

but at least some remaster options may cause problems with some games, so you kinda have to try those and see. someone may have also tested them with the game you’re trying to play with sk, so you can check the remaster database in the sk wiki too.

https://wiki.special-k.info/en/HDR/Retrofit#pipeline-remastering

https://wiki.special-k.info/HDR/Remaster

https://wiki.special-k.info/HDR/Remaster#remaster-database