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You can easily see with your own eyes the difference between good and poor picture quality. However, the technical definitions of image quality are rather complicated: image quality is a mix of contrast ratio, color saturation, accuracy and resolution.

Contrast ratio is the ratio between the darkest and the brightest color your HDTV can produce. Obviously, the higher the contrast ratio is, the better your system is. Low contrast ratio means washed out pictures, dull images and lost details. In the recent years contrast ratio had been greatly improved. Best contrast ratios have a price premium, but technology is getting cheaper. At this time, even the low-end HDTV\’s have decent contrast ratios.

Another important aspect of image quality are the black levels. Systems with poor black levels will have grayish blacks when absolute black is expected. Poor black levels can be especially annoying in dim light conditions, because in this type of light the human eye is very sensitive to dark images. Lot of users set black levels very low, to achieve absolute black. This is a mistake: by doing this, black shadow details can be lost.

High white levels make images vivid and lively, and it is also makes daytime viewing more pleasant. Just as with the blacks, it is not a good idea to set the white levels too high, because details can be lost.

Color temperature, saturation and accuracy are also important elements of picture quality. The natural light temperature is 6500K, and this is the standard for setting the color temperature. Color temperature is below this will be yellowish or reddish, if above, will be bluish. Setting color temperature correctly is important because this can influence every color on your screen.

The color saturation of your HDTV can be adjusted by using the color patterns that come with calibrations discs or TV channels. Color accuracy is a function of how your system decodes image data. Color accuracy is a wide topic: if you don\’t want to be a pro, it is enough for you to know that the color reproduction is accurate when the color encoding used in film production match the decoders of your HDTV.

Greyscale and display characteristic also affect the color reproduction of your HDTV, but again this is above the beginners knowledge about image calibration. You can choose to learn about this, or you can hire a specialist to do it for you.

There are 5 times more pixels in the latest HD resolution than in the Standard Definition. The difference is astonishing: with HD, you can notice details you never knew that existed. Today, 1080 capable HDTVs represent the best money can buy.

Another notion related to resolution is percieved sharpness. This is very similar to the concept of edge contrast used in photography, and it basically means that users have the choice to make the image borders crispier. This gives the sensation of better image quality with the same resolution.

Edward is an electronics expert who writes LCD TV reviews. To read more panasonic hdtv reviews, visit HDTVReviewLab.com

Tags: color accuracy, contrast, HDTV, lcd tv, picture quality, plasma tv, saturation, tv