What Are Color Gamuts and Color Spaces in TVs and Monitors, and Do They Matter?

Back successful the 1950s, erstwhile colour TV was invented, everything was simple. TVs were either colour oregon black-and-white, and you could archer astatine a glimpse which was which. Today, you tin find TVs and monitors that someway committedness more colors, but what does that mean? And wherefore bash manufacturers usage confusing jargon similar colour spaces and colour gamuts to explicate it? Let’s interruption it down.

Most likely, you've seen the presumption “color space” oregon “color gamut” portion shopping for a high-dynamic-range TV, but you’ll besides spot them popular up astir definite computer monitors, particularly ones designed for gaming. Sometimes a shaper volition accidental that a show covers immoderate percent of a peculiar colour space, similar DCI-P3 oregon Rec. 2020.

If nary of these words mean thing to you, past it’s probably good if you disregard them. All astir radical truly request to cognize is whether their show supports HDR—a important upgrade to colour displays that tin nutrient implicit a cardinal colors successful bright, vivid detail. But if you bash a batch of media editing, oregon you attraction astir getting the astir close colour reproduction you can, here’s however to construe each the jargon.

What Is a Color Gamut?

As you mightiness callback from mediate schoolhouse subject class, colour is simply however our squishy quality eyes comprehend antithetic wavelengths of light. The spectrum of wavelengths that we tin spot is lone a tiny subset of the full electromagnetic spectrum. So, a colour show volition amusement each the colors that a quality oculus tin see. Right?

Well, not exactly. In fact, each show you’ve ever seen lone shows a tiny information of the colors that your eyes are susceptible of perceiving. That information is what’s referred to arsenic a “color gamut.” A colour gamut refers to the scope of colors wrong the disposable airy spectrum that the show is susceptible of reproducing.

It mightiness not look similar determination are colors missing from your display, due to the fact that you spot approximations of astir colors, but determination are definite colors that simply can’t beryllium shown. For a elemental comparison, SDR (standard dynamic range) TVs are susceptible of displaying implicit 16.7 cardinal colors—more specifically, determination are 16.7 cardinal unsocial combinations of the 256 antithetic levels of red, green, and bluish that the show tin produce.

An HDR TV, connected the different hand, is susceptible of astatine slightest 1,024 antithetic levels of red, green, and bluish each, for implicit 1.07 billion unsocial colour combinations. This dramatically expands however overmuch of the disposable spectrum that displays tin reproduce. But it besides means that each the contented that you spot connected your display—every show, movie, oregon video game—has to beryllium created with those caller colour options successful mind.

What Is a Color Space?

The word “color space” refers to not lone a scope of colors, but a circumstantial mode of organizing colors successful a mode that instrumentality manufacturers tin notation to and support. For example, the sRGB colour space is utilized to specify the 16.7 cardinal colors that astir SDR monitors and TVs person been producing for years.

Most of these colour spaces are defined successful portion by their narration to the CIE 1931 colour space, which quantifies each of the colors that are disposable to the quality eye. The plethora of different colour spaces retired determination specify a subset of these colors, with immoderate utilized to specify colors for purposes similar printing. When buying for a show oregon TV, determination are a fewer cardinal ones worthy keeping your oculus retired for: