Calling all CRT owners: photos please!

[MajorPainTheCactus]

As CRT’s are getting older and no new ones are being made, we are left facing a future of these fantastic displays dying out. As people on this forum well know, one avenue to help alleviate this issue is to reproduce them in the digital form. In order to do that we really need close up standardised shots of the CRTs that are still working.

This is a call out to everybody who owns a CRT to post photo’s of their displays here so that we can attempt to reproduce them for the future.

Instructions

Android: Go to ‘Pro’ or ‘Manual’ mode on your camera app and set these settings: ISO 100, White Balance 5000, Shutter speed 1/60, Magnification Max Zoom (Macro). Maximum photo resolution.

iOS: Sadly the default camera app isn’t good for CRT photographing so if possible use a third party camera and set the Android settings above. If you can’t borrow a phone or get a third party camera app dont let that put you off taking pictures with your iPhone and posting them, just tag them as such.

Camera: Match the Android settings.

Ideally do this in a darkened room without any tilt in the camera with respect to the screen.

For all camera’s take a picture of a scene that is easily re-producable i.e opening scenes that are colourful so that developers can get to them quickly. Link from Legend of Zelda on SNES or Randi from Secret of Mana are good but it doesn’t matter what as long as its colourful and detailed.

Open the photo on your phone and then zoom in and take a screenshot and then post the screenshot here. When you post below, tag underneath the photo as much detail on the settings used.

Dont forget TV make and model!!!

Examples

Sony PVM 2730QM - MiSTer over RGB component - Normal Settings

Randi - Secret of Mana SNES

OnePlus 8 Pro Camera: Pro Mode, ISO 100, WB 5000K, Aperture Speed 1/60, about 10cm from the screen, 48MPixel JPEG.

Link - Legend of Zelda SNES

OnePlus 8 Pro Camera: Pro Mode, ISO 100, WB 5000K, Aperture Speed 1/60, about 10cm from the screen, 48MPixel JPEG.

Please spread the word where ever you can so that hopefully we can get as wide a range of displays as possible.

Many thanks in advance!

[Syh]

I’ll try to get some shots of my slotmask display later with Mister over component. (I’ll just add them to this post in the thread as to not clutter it.)

[Syh]

@MajorPainTheCactus So my camera app is lame and I don’t have a 5k white balance option.

I have 2.8k, 4k, 5.5k, and 6.5k (and auto ).

Do you want me to just go for 5.5k on the white balance or go to 4k? 5.5k makes more sense to me as the jump is smaller.

I think I’m just going to go download a new camera app, I can’t set shutter speed either.

[MajorPainTheCactus]

No worries do whatever is nearest - probably the key is just noting the settings below the picture and then we can alter images ourselves according to needs. Thanks for doing this!!!

[DariusG]

Just a normal Trinitron 14" running on PC with crt emudriver, VGA to scart, switchres on original resolution

Sony KV14LM1E

DSC-0904

[Syh]

I’m going to wait until tonight to take those as my CRT has a window directly across from it.

So far this is what my settings are looking like:

ISO: 100
Shutter: 1/60
Focus: Macro
WB: 4996 or 5014 (these are my two options because pita)
10MPixel camera 😭

[DariusG]

Mine has iso 100, 1/60 but on wb I see some sun, clouds etc lol

[MajorPainTheCactus]

Greatly appreciated! Would it be possible to get it straight on and close up and of something a bit more colourful (if possible)? Like the example images - it’s just it would be difficult to recreate the phosphor and beam shapes from this picture. But again it’s greatly appreciated.

[Syh]

IMHO, Super Mario World’s title screen could probably be a good fast and lazy choice.

[DariusG]

I think in my photo is obvious that every pixel has it’s own (characters are 8*8) so the true “resolution” is around 400 x 270 or so (around that core’s resolution). If I use snes9x then every SNES pixel is around 1,5 on CRT (256 stretched to around 400). Scaling SNES9x at 4x and 4:3 we get (rounded for calculation) 1200 x 900 so we need 3 pixels RGB mask (lottes 2). 2 pixels-cgwg would result in 600 horizontal resolution, mostly PVM.

[MajorPainTheCactus]

It doesn’t have to be a SNES but it also doesn’t matter if it’s scaled as we’re after how the screen behaves. It just needs to be straight on and something that shows how the three different beams (RGB) behave as they go across the screen i.e something with red green and blue and it transitioning between lights and darks of those colours in a small area of the screen.

[DariusG]

Still have this, not so good quality. Not taken with any specific settings, just auto camera of the phone.

DSC-0887

[DariusG]

Check this out, I think it’s what you need.

Sony KV14LM1E

DSC-0938

better quality

DSC-0939

compared the last shot with PVM and the PVM has exactly double pixels horizontally, so should be 800 pixels horizontally while a normal CRT is around 400.

[MajorPainTheCactus]

Thank you @DariusG! These are much better! So I’m trying to understand what’s going on in these photo’s - is your Sony KV14LM1E really showing the Legend of Zelda that red? Your 240 Test Suite image doesn’t seem to have that skew to red in it?

I see you’re taking the photos with a Sony XZ1 - can you try putting the camera into ‘Manual’ mode and set the settings to those in my first post i.e ISO 100, shutter speed 1/60, White Balance 5000/Auto and then put your zoom right up? Also if could try not to have any tilt to the camera with respect to the screen. Sorry for all the bother - I didn’t realise there were so many Android camera apps.

[DariusG]

No it’s more cool in reality, but could be a bit red due to my crappy handmade cable (much cooler if I connect it with Nintendo Wii RGB, the other shot is from Nintendo Wii).

[Tathan]

Give me a week and I’ll give you some pictures of a Bang & Olufsen MX4200 and a PVM 20M2MDU

Thanks for sharing the infos of your camera too, maybe I’ll be able to finally take good pictures with my phone replicating your options

[Syh]

@MajorPainTheCactus My pics are going to be on hold for a minute, I don’t think my phone’s camera can handle it. So I’ll have to ask a friend or something.

[MajorPainTheCactus]

I am REALLY interested in seeing both of those. The Bang & Olufsen is funnily enough the TV I’m trying to simulate at the moment!

Sony PVM HDR 4K Shader

Good evening! So today I had a bit of spare time being in isolation due to COVID (we’re all fine!) and decided to rework my shader to also support slot and shadow masks (I’m keeping the shader separate still) This is my first attempt and I think its looking pretty good so far! Note that the CRT photo is a from a friend who I think used his iPhone and so will be using all sorts of settings and post processing. You can see this in the clipping in the whites of his eyes etc. Also there seems to…

I’m really interested in seeing a standardised photo of this TV.

[DariusG]

Want to see one from Commodore 1084S-P. Mine died years ago. I have that memory that pixels looked like tiny shields and I think resolution should be a bit higher than a normal TV.

There was a C64 monitor 13" with 0.64mm dot pitch, Commodore 1701 that info on internet says it was 320 x 256 resolution, and 1084S has 0.42mm at same size so there is definitely a difference in resolution compared to a normal TV, I guess. Probably 1084 is 640 x 480 but I am curious to see.

[Jamirus]

The Commodore 1084 manual claims “640 lines in center” whatever that means.