You buy a new TV, turn it on and… something is wrong. Producers mean well, but it doesn’t always work out. There are functions that should be turned off immediately after turning on the TV for the first time. Here they are.
What to do after buying a new TV?
Most TVs have two operating modes. The first is the “wow mode” from the living room (bright, sharp, smooth, dynamic). The second is an image that makes sense in everyday life: stable and natural. If you feel that your TV still works in the first mode – it adds additional frames, changes the brightness itself while watching, artificially sharpens the frames – it is worth digging into the settings. It’s only a few minutes of work, but the first time you watch the video you’ll see that it was worth it.
Start with the picture mode
If the TV is in mode Dynamic (Vivid/Dynamic)then everything probably looks as if only colorful fish in 4K were to appear on the screen, which we often see in electronics stores as a demo. When viewed on a daily basis, it simply looks artificial. Try changing the mode to something that will be available under headings like style in the menu Film, Cinema, Movie, Filmmaker. This set of presets should be closer to what the film colorists actually wanted to achieve.
Traffic smoothing: the “soap opera effect” and other surprises
The setting I have in mind has many names – Motion Smoothing, TruMotion, MotionFlow, Auto Motion Plus. The principle is similar: digital TV adds framesto make the movement “smoother”. The side effect can be very specific: the film begins to look like a video from the set or a soap opera (hence the name “soap opera effect”). Movies lose their cinematic character and the image becomes more realistic (the impression of sharpness and less motion blur).
What to do with it after purchasing a TV:
- for movies and series: off;
- for sports: you can leave it, because here higher liquidity is often desirable.
A good starting tip: turn off motion smoothing, watch 5 minutes of the video, then turn it on and compare. This is the best way to see the difference.
Hard often doesn’t mean better
In the TV menu you can find settings like: Sharpnesssometimes “sharpening”, “super resolution”, “edge enhancement”, “contours”, “detail enhancement”. In practice, it’s about edge conquering and artificial contours that don’t look the best.
What to do:
- Sharpness set low (often around zero or a few “lines”; depends on the TV scale);
- if you see white borders around objects or “chalky” edges on faces – this is the effect;
- in the case of low-quality content, such tricks sometimes mask problems, but with a good source they usually do more harm than good.
Plasticine instead of details
Noise reduction and “MPEG noise reduction” are further functions that make sense mainly when the signal is weak (old recordings, high compression). When it comes to movies from streaming in good quality, UHD Blu-ray or console materials, something like this can:
- eat small details (skin, hair, textures),
- smooth the image to a “plasticine” state.
Starting setting:
- Noise Reduction/Digital NO: off
- MPEG NO: off
- exception: if you watch really poor quality content on YouTube or old material and see “floating” grain/artifacts – then you can test these tools.
Dynamic contrast
You will find this function under headings Dynamic Contrast or Contrast Enhancersometimes as additional “HDR enhancers”. These are usually algorithms that constantly change the contrast, and sometimes also the brightness curve, depending on the scene. Side effects:
- losing details in the shadows (so-called “black crush”);
- image burnout in bright parts;
- “pumping” the image (sometimes brighter, sometimes darker).
This function can be turned on for a trial while playing on a game console. It probably won’t work for movies.
Eco mode: savings at the expense of quality
A situation you may find yourself in – you are watching a night scene and suddenly the TV dims and then brightens. There may be two culprits:
- light sensor / ambient light sensor (adjusts the brightness to the room);
- Eco/Energy Saving (aggressively cuts the backlight).
If you want a “cinematic”, stable image, it is worth skipping the Eco mode.
The “wow” effect vs. true colors
Type options Dynamic Color“vivid colors”, “intelligent color temperature”, “adaptive” whatever – this is almost always a recipe for making the image sometimes cooler, sometimes warmer, sometimes more neon. It’s a good idea to turn this feature off for a more consistent image.
A simple test: watch a series where the characters’ faces can be seen in natural light. If the skin turns orange, sometimes pale, and whites “escape” into blue shades – it is a sign that the TV automatically controls the color.
Smart TV and privacy
So much for image-related issues. It’s time for privacy. Many smart TVs have functions to collect data about the content you watch, often under a password ACR (Automatic/Automated Content Recognition). This is a mechanism that can recognize what is on the screen (also from HDMI) and use this data for analytics and advertising. Here’s what you should do after purchasing a TV:
In your privacy settings, turn off:
- services such as “Viewing Information Services” / “Live Plus” / “Smart TV Experience” (names depend on the manufacturer),
- personalized advertisements (“Interest-Based Ads/Advertising”),
- collection of application/device usage data, if described separately.
Check your voice settings:
- if you don’t use the assistant, turn off voice recognition services,
- if the TV has a physical microphone switch or “mic mute” button, use it (this is the simplest, “hardware” way).
If someone cares about privacy, it may also be a sensible option to use an external streaming device instead of the “built-in” TV solutions (in the extreme case, not connecting the TV to the Internet, but this is probably not an option these days).
7 features that are worth turning off
Bottom line, if you want to quickly set up your TV for a natural picture rather than an in-store demo, here’s what you might want to turn off.
- picture mode: Filmmaker/Movie/Cinema
- smoothing traffic: off
- noise reduction + MPEG NR: off
- sharpening/edge enhancement: low
- dynamic contrast / dynamic “enhancers”: off
- Eco + light sensor / auto brightness: off
- privacy: ACR offpersonalized ads offvoice services off (if not using), microphone mute
Do you always have to turn everything off?
Not always. If you watch a lot of highly compressed TV, a little noise reduction can “calm down” the image. Usually (movies + streaming), however, start by turning off these functions and only then test what changes when you turn them on.
What about sports and gaming?
Sports may be the only category where slight adjustments to movement settings may make sense. Movies and TV series most often suffer from liquefaction (hence the whole war about the “soap opera effect”). In turn, in games there is HDR/tone mapping and HGIG modes – but this is a topic for a completely different article.
