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Thursday, August 27, 2009
The Rise of Field Monitors
Richard Harrington | 08/27
Field Monitors See Significant Improvements and Increased Importance in Wake of HD Productions
LCD Field Monitors Have Arrived
LCD field monitors are a popular choice for many reasons including their physical size, portability, low power consumption and ability to produce full resolution, full raster images. LCD monitors come in a variety of sizes from 8 inches all the way up to 50 inches, additionally they can be rack mounted or placed on a stand.
When looking for a good LCD field monitor be sure to check for a few things:
- Resolution and frame rate support –The best LCD field monitors will be able to support a variety of resolutions up to 1920 x 1080 and do so at a variety of frame rates like 60, 29.97 and 24 fps. Also, when shooting interlaced footage good LCD field monitors should be able to accurately interpret interlacing (they’re natively progressive) by doing on-board processing of the interlaced image. There are several approaches to this but the ones we like best are displays that interpret the interlacing into a progressive frame. Many smaller monitors also allow for 1:1 pixel mapping (which will only display part of the picture). This is a useful way to check focus when shooting a large HD image.
- Input options – In the field you never know what you’re going to need to connect to the display, therefore having a range of input options is must. On modern LCD field monitors these inputs would include SD/HD SDI, SD/HD component video, HDMI and composite video inputs. Having multiple inputs lets you also attach several cameras so you can quickly switch between on a multi-camera shoot.
Power options – Many LCD field monitors are extremely flexible for the type of power they need. On base level this means the ability to switch between power systems (120/220) but also have the ability to be powered by field battery packs in situations were access to AC power is not available. Don’t let the lack of an extension cord keep you from gauging an accurate picture.
- Viewing Angle –LCD monitors used to be plagued by a viewing angle issue. That is to say that if you viewed the picture from the side the color would look different than if you stood dead center. Fortunately this issue has been solved and many monitors boast viewing angles of up to 178˚ (no, you can’t view a picture standing behind the monitor yet).
Built-in Scopes – I recently purchased the Panasonic BT-LH1710 field monitor. One of its best features is that it offers several overlays including an HD Waveform and Vectorscope, which add a level of confidence when gauging image quality.
- Useful Overlays –Monitors are also offering additional overlays these days. Shooting HD but want to protect action for a 4:3 set? Turn on Aspect Markers. Want to check that the camera is straight? Turn on a cross hatch overlay and look for tilt.
- Audio Monitoring – Want to check audio? Many field monitors have built-in speakers so clients can listen in. Concerned about sound? They offer headphone jacks for more private listening. Some monitors (like the aforementioned BT-LH1710) even have Audio Level Meters as an extra precaution for ensuring proper audio is being recorded (you can even turn on peak meters to show clipping).
Calibrating field monitors
You’ve chosen what type of field monitor you are going to use, but without proper calibration even the best monitor won’t do you any good. You can calibrate your monitor of choice in a couple different ways:
- Using built in or feeding Color Bars– Standard color bars are a tried and true method for calibrating monitors. The procedure is the same for every type of monitor.
- Shoot on-set test patterns – While less accurate for a variety of reasons like lighting and lens quality, in a pinch you can shoot test patterns on-set and use those patterns to adjust your field monitors
- Hardware Calibration – Sometimes to get the best, you must pay for it. Calibration engineers do exactly what their job titles imply. A calibration engineer will use dedicated hardware to calibrate your monitor prior to it leaving for a shoot or even on-set using reference standards like those published by SMPTE (Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers)
The Bottom Line
Monitoring needs to become a part of your everyday production process. While DPs have known this for years, all crew need to start to pay increased attention to monitors on set. In the HD world, image quality is king. The viewfinder can no longer be trusted.
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Look for SmallHD brand.. or Marshall
Posted by Richard Harrington on 05/21 at 11:27 AM
Just found the Marshall. Your note informed me of the smallHD brand for the first time though. That little thing looks great!
Hard to tell from the website if they are actually shipping at this point in time.
Also nothing live on what batteries they run on.
Looks good though nonetheless. Maybe put a bit of downward pricing pressure on everyone else…...
Love my Pannie 17-inch monitor, but it’s just too much to use on the shorter mobile client site shoots that I am getting more and more of.
Posted by JeffBach on 05/21 at 11:59 AM
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