Matching RGB colors to look like on the screen

[Mike_Geppert]

Working on Halloween display and primary colors (R/G/B/W) look great.  Colors like Orange and Purple look more like Yellow and Blue.

I tried to apply the RGB Intensity Curve 50%.  This makes the Orange look good, but Purple is still washed out (more white then Blue).  I tried to make a darker Purple and it didn't seem to help.

What are other people doing to fix this? 

Kind of glad I hooked up some lights to take a look at what they really do. 

I have both Dumb and Smart RGB lights in the display.  Currently only looking at the Dumb, but working on hooking a few strings of Smart RGB to see what they do.

Thanks

[PhilMassey]

For purple try increasing the red and or decrease the blue levels.

For orange pull down the green to half or less of the value of the red.

Adjust to your liking.

[k6ccc]

One of my standard recommendations is to test with the lights you will be using.  Because there are often substantial differences between different pixels, it is important to check each batch.

I got a vivid reminder of that with my P10 panels vs my P5 panels.  Right now they are hanging one above the other in my family room so easy to see the difference.  Bring them both up to full white and the color difference is so pronounced that you would think I was not going to full white.

 

[GriswoldStyle]

I'm still new to this actually only a couple days into pixels. But figured out a few help methods when I was working with dumb RGB. Not sure if this helps you or not but I went through and made a cheat track of color fades and then I just select the one square color that I like the most and match the color intensities to whatever color I'm needing for the section of the sequence I'm working on. Also an RGB html code list works wonders if you like to put the numbers in for the colors directly.

What k6ccc said is spot on. every type/brand of rgb will display color differently. it makes more sense to test it in front of you so you know what color it's going to render in the long run. 

[Mr. P]

One more tip: when creating a prop, tree, matrix or anything where there are a lot of pixels in close proximity make sure to use the same brand/maker of pixels. Each brand may be off in color compared to another and you don't want to have a tree or something that would be two different shades of blue.

I have a 16 strip pixel tree that had two strips go out last year. Instead of replacing the two strips I am replacing all 16 strip with the same pixel brand so they match. the old pixel strips that still work will get used somewhere else.

Edited August 1, 2018 by Mr. P

[Orville]

To make purple on the current LOR Pixel Nodes {smart pixels} I have I used a 30% red and 60% blue to get a shade of purple, it still looks pinkish though.  I have yet to find a suitable combination for a "perfect purple" unless I buy a strand of only purple L.E.D. lights, which I have some of those for other non-multi color use.  Purple seems to be a very difficult color to create using the RGB pixels.  I've tried hundreds of combinations and even using this site: https://www.rapidtables.com/web/color/RGB_Color.html to try and get the perfect color for purple, gets to the same color I get with a slightly different variation on a percentage for each of the 3 colors.  But I just use the 30% red/60% blue and let it suffice at that.

For orange I use 100% red and 7% green, this one does seem to do a fairly decent job of representing orange.  I get a  much better orange than I do purple!

Good luck getting that perfect purple or orange, if you manage to get it, let us know what percentages you used to achieve it.

                                                  

[k6ccc]

For purple I’m using 100/0/100 or 100/0/50 depending if I want a dark purple or a lighter on.  Orange I think is 100/12/0.

 

[dibblejr]

Is the old color chart no longer applicable?

Just wondering since I have a copy I downloaded last year from the Ausi website, I also remember someone here on the forums sharing it but not sure who it was.

Similar to this one https://www.rapidtables.com/web/color/RGB_Color.html

Mine is not just color and codes, not automatic. If I see purple it tells me the color % needed.

JR

Edited August 2, 2018 by dibblejr

[k6ccc]

A color chart is a good starting point, but there is enough variations in the colors from RGB lights (dumb or smart) that you need to light them up and see what they actually look like.

To give you an idea how much variation there can be, the two panel shown below are both full white:

Note that the horizontal bands in the lower panel is that way only because of shutter speed.  To the human eye, the panel really looks more like the lighter color bars.

I'm still tweeking the color levels to get them to match, but to get a white I like, the top one I set to 255 / 170 / 190 (out of 255) and the bottom one to 255 / 240 / 190.  But those numbers are pretty close.  I don't really need them to be perfect because no one will be able to see them both at the same time.

 

[dibblejr]

14 minutes ago, k6ccc said:

A color chart is a good starting point, but there is enough variations in the colors from RGB lights (dumb or smart) that you need to light them up and see what they actually look like.

To give you an idea how much variation there can be, the two panel shown below are both full white:

Note that the horizontal bands in the lower panel is that way only because of shutter speed.  To the human eye, the panel really looks more like the lighter color bars.

I'm still tweeking the color levels to get them to match, but to get a white I like, the top one I set to 255 / 170 / 190 (out of 255) and the bottom one to 255 / 240 / 190.  But those numbers are pretty close.  I don't really need them to be perfect because no one will be able to see them both at the same time.

 

Are your panels enclosed or are you still working on that, or not going outside so not required? Just asking, someone local was selling a nice p5 panel fully enclosed but I wasn't ready to move that way yet so I didn't pull the trigger.

JR

[k6ccc]

Those are not yet enclosed.  Here's one in the light:

They are just hanging from the ceiling in my family room.

 

[dibblejr]

4 minutes ago, k6ccc said:

Those are not yet enclosed.  Here's one in the light:

They are just hanging from the ceiling in my family room.

 

Used all of my likes today. I def like those and I like what I think you are planning to use them for. Next year I will def have to get one of the kits. I've got 2 more pixel matrixs to build this year. Already have everything but the energy. When school starts back up I will have more time.

JR

[k6ccc]

3 minutes ago, dibblejr said:

Used all of my likes today. I def like those and I like what I think you are planning to use them for. Next year I will def have to get one of the kits. I've got 2 more pixel matrixs to build this year. Already have everything but the energy. When school starts back up I will have more time.

JR

Thanks!

Yea, I like them too.  The upper one is 4W x 3H P10 matrix which comes out to 6,144 pixels or 18,432 channels.  The lower one is a 3W x 2H P5 matrix which comes out to 12,288 pixels or 36,864 channels.  Because of the way I will place them, the P10 panel will mostly be viewed by people 50 to 75 feet away, whereas the P5 panel may have people only a few feet away and seldom over 25 feet, so the higher resolution make a lot of sense.

BTW, those are being driven by LOR S5 via E1.31.