The Gamut Rings diagram is a new way to visualize the color performance of a display. It has been standardized by leading metrology organizations, such as CIE, IEC and ICDM, so now is the time to educate professionals and even consumers on this new capability. In short, the Gamut Rings method provides an easier and more intuitive way to understand the color reproducing capabilities of the display – be it a cell phone, monitor, TV or any other display-containing product. It overcomes the limitations of commonly-used (and incomplete) color visualization methods like the 1931 and 1976 CIE diagrams that provide a 2D means of visualizing a 3D color volume.

While showing the Gamut Rings diagram for a reference standard is important, one ultimately wants to measure the performance of a display and compare it to a reference standard like BT.2020. This diagram is called the Gamut Rings Intersection.

To do this, one first measures the color volume of the display using a program like Calman. This software can then create a Gamut Rings intersection plot. The Figure below illustrates how the display’s Gamut Rings data is compared to the BT.2020 reference standard (the black rings). Wherever there is gray in the image, it means the display is unable to present those colors to the full saturation of the reference standard. For the case shown in this Figure, it shows that the display is unable to reproduce all the colors in the reference standard over a wide range of lightness (luminance) values.

Final Gamut Rings result with measured data and BT.2020 target

To learn more about this new color evaluation tool, you can download the white paper for free at the link below.

Chris Chinnock, Insight Media