If you want to enjoy higher image quality, then calibrating your screen is a must. It does not matter if it is a computer monitor or a television. What's more, we could say that almost all screens should be calibrated regardless of what range they belong to. Because the experience not only depends on the configuration, but also on the lighting conditions that surround it.
Samsung and its new app for the calibration of its screens
Screen calibration is one of those things that few really pay attention to. Only those users with a professional profile (such as photographers, designers and videographers) usually give it the attention it deserves. Because they know how important it is in terms of the final results of their work.
However, for most consumers it is something secondary and in the best of cases what some do is resort to the predefined image modes that their televisions incorporate. That is, the movie modes, video games, sports, etc. Although this may change soon thanks to the use of applications such as Samsung EZCal.
Samsung appears to be working on a application that you can run on your mobile phone (something that already can be done from an iPhone) and that it will communicate automatically with your televisions to calibrate the image automatically. Surely using all that environment created from Samsung Smart Things and taking advantage of the data that the device's camera would record when it pointed to the screen.
So by measuring the intensity of the light emitted by the screen by calculating the exposure, also that of the surrounding environment, white balance, etc., it is assumed that it could analyze all the necessary data to later adjust parameters such as brightness , contrast or color.
At least it is what is intuited, since there is still not much data about it, the process and neither the support or compatibility both with issues of phones where it could run and televisions with which to use it.
A real substitute for colorimeters?
If you are one of the users who do care about having their screens perfectly calibrated, regardless of whether they are monitors or televisions, you will know that there is nothing better than a colorimeter. The problem is that if you do not have a certain profile, it is true that it is not usually a habitual investment by the majority.
That is why most of what they do is resort to different methods such as specific software or images used to display specific patterns which together with a series of additional indications allow each parameter to be adjusted by eye. A perfectly valid method, although it requires some sharpness on the part of the user and that is why if a mobile app like this one from Samsung really works, it could replace a colorimeter for many users.
The only thing is that a series of minimum requirements would have to be met, the main one being the device where it would be used. Because as we said, without much data about how the entire process would be carried out, if the smartphone's sensor is not capable of measuring each adjustment correctly, it will be ineffective compared to doing it by eye. It is also clear that either they manage to do a reading and subsequent summary on the screen to change manually or it will be limited to Samsung TVs with Tizen. Which would also make sense and add value to your catalog.
However, EZCal has not yet been officially launched and it is part of a program that gives rise to innovation, although that does not mean that it will end up becoming a reality. At least not in the same way as it is now known. And by the way, if what you are looking for is to calibrate your monitor more than your television, here we explain how to calibrate your screen without calibrator.