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Conclusion
When looking at old-school professional monitors, one sees exotic backlights like GbR or even RGB LED. Some new screens have quantum dot filters too. These technologies serve to enlarge the color gamut and increase color accuracy. But new-school displays have taken a different path to excellence. Rather than employing expensive components, they simply improve and refine more commonly available panels, thereby lowering the cost of admission.
The VP2768 is a perfect example of this phenomenon. At its core, it’s an IPS panel with QHD resolution and an sRGB color gamut. That describes many business-class monitors that sell for less than $400. But ViewSonic has taken a value-oriented path while creating a display qualified for professional use. For just over $500, you get better build quality, an internal 14-bit look-up table, and factory-certified calibrations for multiple color gamuts.
Unless you need the wider gamuts provided by DCI-P3 and Adobe RGB, the VP2768 provides a spot-on presentation of sRGB, Rec.709, EBU, and SMPTE-C. For video content producers, that will cover the bulk of their work. Ultra HD may be the shiny new standard with its extended color, resolution, and dynamic range, courtesy of HDR. But it hasn’t replaced traditional high definition just yet.
But the VP2768 isn’t quite future-proof. The time will come when DCI-P3 is the de facto standard, on all displays, at all price points. When that day arrives, professional monitors will have to support both extended color and HDR to truly be useful. For the next couple of years, though, we believe there is a need for value priced professional displays like this.
Despite a vast array of calibration options, including the add-on Colorbration kit, the VP2768 is one of the most accurate monitors we’ve ever tested in its out-of-box state. We achieved small gains with a manual adjustment, but it didn’t impact the image visually. It truly doesn’t get much better than what we saw in both our tests and when viewing real-world content.
The industry is at something of a turning point when it comes to color standards. Consumer televisions are starting to support DCI-P3 and Ultra HD resolution in hopes of luring viewers to UHD Blu-ray and streaming content presented in 4K. But many screens advertising these features haven’t adequately done them justice. HDR is an especially difficult thing to do correctly.
The VP2768 represents an excellent value for a 27” QHD/IPS monitor that delivers nearly unmatched out-of-box performance and a tremendous array of calibration choices. Professionals needing the sRGB and Rec.709 color gamuts who are looking a save a bit of cash will want to seriously consider it.
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