Crushed blacks and game world too dark after HDR patch on 11/30

Twohothardware · December 2016

I'm on the PS4 Pro with a 4k monitor that does not support HDR and so I have set HDR to off on my PS4 but the game is still much darker than it was prior to the patch and it's causing an effect known as crushed blacks where there is a loss of detail in dark areas of the image.

Here is an example of what I mean by crushed blacks:

http://forums.solidsignal.com/content.php/525-What-are-crushed-blacks-(and-why-are-they-bad-)

My monitor's brightness is already set at the default 100% and it's not something that simply can be fixed by increasing the in-game brightness because all that does is wash out the colors. Whatever it is they changed I hope they revert those adjustments in this patch back to what they were before because my 4k monitor looked great prior to this update.

geonsocal · December 2016

howdy @Twohothardware ...@TruthSeeker posted this on another thread:

PS4 settings>sound and screen>video output settings> and then make sure both HDR and Deep Color Output are set to Off...

scary thing is - mine was already set like that and I still noticed a change...I went into my TV settings and dialed down my "color" setting a little...

TruthSeeker · December 2016

There's a yellowish tinge to the game this morning.

It's not an improvement.

Much of the white lettering is now a dirty shade of yellow

Oops, the yucky yellow was correctable at my end. My visuals were set for Movie mode. Just changed them back to Natural. Phew, back to normal

Twohothardware · December 2016

geonsocal wrote: »

howdy @Twohothardware ...@TruthSeeker posted this on another thread:

PS4 settings>sound and screen>video output settings> and then make sure both HDR and Deep Color Output are set to Off...

scary thing is - mine was already set like that and I still noticed a change...I went into my TV settings and dialed down my "color" setting a little...

I've already tried turning both off and have had HDR off the whole time. On my LG 4k (non HDR) monitor I have to enable a setting called HDMI ULTRA HD Deep Color in order for 4k resolution to even work otherwise it won't let me select above 1080p but the graphics looked great until this patch. They need to revert whatever they did so that there's no difference from this HDR patch unless you have a display that supports HDR and it is enabled. Right now the graphics are just too dark and I'm getting what is referred to as crushed blacks where the black levels or contrast is too much and anything dark loses detail.

Aurielle · December 2016

Twohothardware wrote: »

Whatever it is they changed I hope they revert the graphics adjustments in this patch back to what they were before because my 4k monitor looked great prior to this update.

Agreed. I, too, am getting crushed blacks on my standard PS4 slim with all HDR-related settings turned off. I'm not about to shell out thousands of dollars for a 4K TV with HDR just to play ESO with the same sort of clarity I had before.

Can we get any green-name responses to this issue? I'm going to go out on a limb here and suggest that the average PS4 player does NOT have an ultra-expensive 4K HDR TV. Why would you implement a change that only benefits a small portion of your user base, and negatively affects the rest? These graphical changes should ONLY take effect when HDR/Deep Colour Output is enabled on the PS4. That is currently not the case. I had those settings disabled before the patch, and I still noticed a drastic change.

kylewwefan · December 2016

The game got much darker on regular PS4 also. It's not just the pro and 4K tv thing. It did make some things seem to shine more though.

Twohothardware · December 2016

kylewwefan wrote: »

The game got much darker on regular PS4 also. It's not just the pro and 4K tv thing. It did make some things seem to shine more though.

It's like they jacked the contrast up which may give the impression that some things are more shiny or colorful but the end result is the crushed blacks, loss of detail, and it's so dark indoors you can barely see in some areas where there isn't a lot of lighting.

RouDeR · December 2016

My tv is samaung ks7002 with hdr support but even with working hdr the game looks dark as *** , when i change the hdr brightness and ingame brightness to make the image better the colors got messed and the buildings are apearing blue .... i have no problem with HDR turned off on my tv and console , the game looks same as before . I hope the devs will fix this blackish issue .

vivisectvib16_ESO · December 2016

Also having an issue with the game gamma post-patch. I'm on a launch PS4 + 1080p Sony TV and the game is super dark compared to pre-patch.

Aurielle · December 2016

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/308356/playstation-4-patch-notes-v1-20

Thanks for hearing our concerns and fixing this, ZOS. I just logged in briefly, tweaked my brightness settings slightly (they were a tad too high, thanks to the darkness of the previous update), and everything's back to normal now. Performance also seems ever so slightly better, as well, but that could just be time of day related.

vivisectvib16_ESO · December 2016

Will have to test this as I didn't notice these notes until today. I was only in brightly lit areas last night.

MaKTaiL · December 2016

Standard PS4 now has crushed blacks instead... I had to increase my brightness.

vivisectvib16_ESO · December 2016

Game is still way too dark on Standard PS4. No change I can notice at all since the patch that apparently "fixed" this..?

pattyLtd · December 2016

I know there has been a "fix" for this amd im not sure if that should have fixed this.
If it wasnt for the huge bump in performance (less laggy) i would honestly just switch back tomy old ps4.

I have a sony 4K TV thát doesnt support HDR and i'm tired of changing my brightness setting everytime i enter a different area in the game. I can barely see my character unless if im in the option screen

I'm not technical amd i do t know what im supposed to do to fix this besides messing with a brightness slider.
I also had to change the hdmi input to get it to display in 4K like @Twohothardware

Have you guys managed to fix this true settings or did the patch fix it.
Eternal darkness online not fun

FreqTilitHertz · January 2017

I'm glad I found this thread and know that I am not the only one with the "too dark to play" problem with the HDR patch. What seemed to do the trick for me was changing the RGB Range setting on the PS4 from Automatic (Recommended) to LIMITED.

Settings > Sound and Screen > Video Output Settings:

RGB Range: Limited
HDR: Auto
Deep Color Output: Auto

This did the trick for me but I'm not sure if it'll work for everyone, but you might want to give that a try so we might be able to help ZOS find a solution. You might even want to turn HDR and Deep Color Output to OFF if leaving it on Auto still doesn't help. Here is a great article explaining the difference between RGB Full and Limited: referencehometheater.com/2014/commentary/rgb-full-vs-limited/

Here is my setup:

PS4 Standard
Display 1: Samsung UN55JS8500 4K (2015)
Display 2: BenQ W1070 1080P Projector on a 110" Screen

Both my displays are calibrated for movie viewing using Spears & Munsil's Blu-ray calibration disc along with a ColorMunki and CalMan software. This means my contrast levels are pretty high but brightness is set to well below 50%.