DVDPlayer B.L.E. setting?

[wiseant]

Hi All,

Hope I've got the right forum
I have a LG DVDPlayer LDA-730 that also plays DivX/XviD
I am quite happy with this player but one thing I noticed in the owners manual was a setting for B.L.E. (Black Level Expansion) :
"To select the black level of playback pictures. Set your preference and monitor's ability.
on: Expanded grey scale. (0 IRE cut off)
off: Standard grey scale (7.5 IRE cut off)"

I'm wondering what this actually means, and I am wondering why LG used the word "monitor" instead of TV

I read through this thread:
http://www.hometheaterforum.com/htf/display-devices-tvs-projectors/115480-black-level-...ire-0-ire.html
which just caused more confusion

- is Standard grey scale 16-235 so I should select "off" if playing a video that was encoded using 16-235 range?
- is Expanded grey scale 0-255 so I should select "on" if playing a video that was encoded using 0-255 range?

If this is the case, then does it make sense that it does not matter what color range the video was encoded at because I can change to the appropriate BLE? That is, if I have a video that has a range of 0-255 I don't need to do a ColorYUV(levels="PC->TV") conversion because this player will do it automatically?

TIA

[wiseant]

Well I did some more searching and found this information (for future reference):

"Black-level expansion/white-level compression automatically adjusts the contrast ratio between black and white levels to produce blacker blacks, whiter whites, and extraordinarily sharp edges with no loss of picture detail or subtle shading (on NTSC signals only)."

"Video Black Level Expansion and PLUGE
Grayscale in video is measured and tracked on a scale of 0 (black) to 100 (white) IRE units. In NTSC video we have traditionally assigned the 7.5 IRE value as being the black cutoff in a picture. The EXPANDED mode in the "Video Black Level Setting" menu enables Toshiba DVD players to output a 0 IRE signal for richer, deeper black tones in every image."

"Black Level Expansion
The Black Level Expansion enables the Marantz LC2000 to output richer and deeper black tones in every image.
Dark areas are stretched to black, while bright areas remain unchanged. Advantageously, this black level processing is performed dynamically and only if it will be most noticeable to the viewer. It enhances the contrast and prevents the black signal from becoming gray if the brightness is increased. It allows for a darker picture with-out it going completely black. Which thereby allows richer picture tones."

And probably the best explanation comes from:
http://www.glennchan.info/articles/technical/setup/75IREsetup.html

He has some interesting other topics at:
http://www.glennchan.info/articles/articles.html