- At a press conference just before the opening of the show floor at InfoComm in Las Vegas Wednesday, Sony unveiled its new large-format direct-View LED product, Canvas. A year after a prototype version was shown in a much-talked-about "whisper room" (invitation-only) event at InfoComm 2015, the product– now ready for prime time according to Sony– was shown Wednesday morning in an impressive demo of high res video on a huge, seamless, fine pixel pitch display. The display is on view, to all attendees, all this week at the Sony Booth at the InfoComm show in Las Vegas.
Sony engineers say that the "ultrafine" RGB LED's mounted in the display, are pixels that are 1/100th the size of a traditional LED pixel, resulting the 99% black area. Basically, smaller pixels, and more black surrounding the pixels.
Sony’s new technology will, according to the company, “redefine large scale display– just like we did with the Jumbotron,” said Kevin O’Conner of Sony at the press event, alluding to the ubiquitous outdoor display technology of previous decades. The new technology, Crystal Light Emitting Diode Integrated Structure (CLEDIS), uses Sony’s ultrafine LEDs in a unique surface mounting structure as its light source to deliver a visual experience not possible with even the highest end conventional LED array. This scalable new type of canvas delivers, according to Sony, "an unmatched viewing experience, offering 99% black surface area, for high contrast, high resolution and immersive visuals. This new type of canvas enables limitless flexibility and creativity in public spaces and high-end visual entertainment. It is far more advanced when compared to the technologies currently available for large-scale display, offering a leap forward in depth, contrast, color, resolution and impact."
Sony engineers say that the "ultrafine" RGB LED's mounted in the display, are pixels that are 1/100th the size of a traditional LED pixel, resulting in the 99% black area, that Sony says contributes to an even higher contrast ratio than what is possible with conventional fine pixel pitch direct view LED. Basically, smaller pixels, and more black surrounding the pixels. While Sony is not officially giving a pixel pitch spec, it's estimated at about 1.2mm. The result to my eye, in person at the press conference, was a large format image where it was not possible to see the "seams" between the individual tiles.
