NEWS IFA BERLIN
IFA Berlin 2017: Europe’s premier electronics show had more than its fair share of television product launches this year, with OLED TVs again firmly in the self-emissive spotlight.
Panasonic launched its largest ever OLED, the 77-incher for its EZ1000 range (we reviewed the 65-incher last issue), while LG brought its now-legendary OLED tunnel to wow the crowds, while demonstrating its LG Signature OLED TV ‘W’, and also a new ‘Technicolor Expert Mode’ for its 2017 OLEDs, with colours “optimised by Technicolor’s colour scientists who work on the majority of Hollywood’s premium content”. Technicolor Expert Mode will come via firmware update to the picture settings menu of all LG’s 2017 OLED TVs starting around now, and possibly later for LED-LCD models as well. It should work with both standard and HDR content. Sony showed the A1 OLED which we review this issue but also in a stonking 77-inch size; while Bang
& Olufsen brought the Beovision Eclipse announced just before the event. Philips gained acclaim for its latest and largest Ambilight-equipped OLED, the 65-inch OLED 9, with content-driven coloured lights on three sides, and an Android TV interface. Will it come to Australia? Not yet known.
Given that TV-sized OLED panels are still all sourced from LG. Display, the growth in uptake and the number of brands now using them (add in Loewe, Metz/Skyworth, and Grundig, pictured right with Miss IFA) must be starting to push on LG. Display’s supply lines. No new TV-sized OLED fabrication facilities will open until at least 2019, and if that plant is delayed, or if production shifts to the higher profit margins of automotive displays, we may see an OLED panel shortage.
Meanwhile there’s a new horse in the HDR race, with 20th Century Fox, Panasonic and Samsung using IFA 2017 to announce a new partnership to create HDR10+. This will add dynamic metadata to HDR10, as already used in the superior Dolby Vision HDR system to allow scene-by-scene curve adjustments. But the message was confused by talk of HDR10+ being “licensed”, yet “royalty-free”, and “open” yet requiring certification... and from the released information one might read that the new partnership will actually license the metadata itself, in addition to the technology presumably required by the platform. We’ll let you know as we find out more. After all, this announcement isn’t saying HDR10+ even exists yet — it’s announcing a partnership that will create a platform for licensing it.