Recently, I had a weird experience. First, let’s flashback to Black Friday, 2013. It was cold and way too early. At the time the doorbuster deal worth standing in line for through the night was a 47” 1080p Vizio LCD TV for $313. It replaced my 20” tv from college. Playing PS3 on a larger screen, watching movies in high quality 1080p Blu-Ray, and having a working remote was a wonderful upgrade. Flashforward, alas, I finally had to retire that TV after 13 years of service. While impressive, that longevity is not the weird part.
My wife works in IT and has a lot of experience buying current tvs for conference rooms, lobby displays, and similar use cases. She found us a 55” 4K Insignia for less than $200. After setting it up, we flipped to one of our favorite YouTubers, Philip DeFranco, and our eyes were opened to a whole new world of 4k video, but not in the way we expected. Unlike before, we could now see all of his pores in stunning detail. Too much! We switched to some Josh Johnson Standup and found the same thing plus easily identifiable dead pixels from his team’s weekly multi-camera set up. I wouldn’t have noticed either of those distractions on my old tv. This is the weird part. I’m not sure what I was expecting, but I definitely did not account for the extreme detail effect from the increased resolution.
Video Display
Initially, it was very distracting so I moved my chair away to nearly double my previous viewing distance. Much better! I also adjusted settings by turning sharpness all the way down (-25), boosting color slightly (+5), reducing brightness slightly (-7), slightly reducing contrast, and slightly increasing backlight (our mileage will vary based on your tv model). Before now, I couldn’t dream of any downsides from upgrading to a 4k tv. Clearly, this is going to take some time to get used to, but is it necessary? I was perfectly happy with my 1080p tv and on occasion my 1080p projector blown up to a 9’+ diagonal on a wall. That felt like plenty and I wasn’t distracted by seeing every minute detail in medium and close up shots. This brings me to my main questions. What specs are enough for displaying video? What about video cameras? What do I believe to be the minimum requirements for video capture vs video display? It prompted some nice reflection, a bit of research, and a trip to the eye doctor.
To 4k or Not to 4k?
In 2017, I saw this video, “You Don’t See in 4K”, and then never felt compelled to upgrade my tv to 4k. Now it seems at a certain size of tv, 4K is the most common or only resolution readily available. In the video, the content creator dives into all the variables impacting the viewing experience, from distance to the screen, size of the screen, resolution, contrast, color bit depth, etc to the inner workings of the rods and cones of our eyes… The gist I gleaned from it was that 4k feels like the point of diminishing returns for the human eye in most home theater setups.
Furthermore, a lot of content created today is mobile first. Most mobile screens are around 1080p. Most movie theaters project in 2K, slightly wider resolution than the 1,920 pixels across a 1080p image. Lower resolution avoids those unnecessary distractions I experienced with my new tv, but I’m not sure if they would be noticed on such a small screen as with phones even if they were 4k. In my professional experience, if something is shot well technically and with artistic intent, it will look great in 1080p and will likely upscale nicely with modern editing software if needed. On the flip side, if something is shot poorly from a technical perspective and/or lacks artistic intent, viewing it on a higher resolution display will amplify that. Viewing the same video on a lower resolution display may help hide distracting details found in higher resolution recordings.
The Choice is Yours...
Ultimately, how much detail and resolution is needed to tell a good story? How much is needed to watch that story? It depends on the story. The recently released “PrimeTime”, with Robert Pattinson, utilized a variety of cameras including some older miniDV cameras for portions of the story. MiniDV cameras typically record in SD 480p or HD 720p. This movie, released in 2026, exceeded “box office expectations, scoring $19.2 million from 2,863 North American venues in its opening weekend.” In this case, the resolution is part of the story. I’m sure the scenes utilizing those cameras would hit differently if they were shot and displayed in 4k or higher resolution.
With all of this in mind, my personal belief is that I really only need a 1080p display to watch video. Would I like a large, 4k, high contrast, HDR display? I’d probably love it, but I don’t have one and don’t need one, especially in this economy. 4K is great, but 1080p delivery is enough for me. If you’re interested in my thoughts on minimum specs for video capture, look for Part 2 in a future newsletter. I’ll dive into my thoughts on what is enough when it comes to the actual recording of video. As someone who has owned (and now sold) a camera capable of recording in 12k, I believe I have a qualified and unique perspective to share.