Oasis 2 vs Voyage dark room screen comparison

[JFHey]

Originally Posted by j.p.s

For the Voyage I would have to take a screen shot, invert it and display that, set the same brightness, then take the picture. (Because of 5.6.1 firmware version.) Would that be acceptable?

Sorry, I expressed myself unclear (and I wouldn't want to cause you so much effort :-) )
What I am curious about is how do Voyage in normal mode, and Oasis in inverted mode compare, in the lowest brightness settings (for night time reading).
I'm curious if The Oasis emits relatively much or little light in inverted mode, in comparison to other ereaders.

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by JFHey

Sorry, I expressed myself unclear (and I wouldn't want to cause you so much effort :-) )
What I am curious about is how do Voyage in normal mode, and Oasis in inverted mode compare, in the lowest brightness settings (for night time reading).
I'm curious if The Oasis emits relatively much or little light in inverted mode, in comparison to other ereaders.

It would not have been that much extra effort, but it would have been a waste to do the wrong comparison. Voyage normal vs Oasis inverted seems like a reasonable comparison given the Oasis relative brightness at the low settings. Since the Oasis light is completely off at brightness 0, how does showing the lowest several Voyage settings with the Oasis setting 1 step higher for each sound?

[JFHey]

Sounds like an excellent plan :-)

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by JFHey

What I am curious about is how do Voyage in normal mode, and Oasis in inverted mode compare, in the lowest brightness settings (for night time reading).
I'm curious if The Oasis emits relatively much or little light in inverted mode, in comparison to other ereaders.

I decided to keep the exposure at 2 seconds F 2.8 and the Voyage at brightness 3 for all pictures with the Oasis brightness ranging from 1 to 5. When my eyes are completely dark adapted and I am completely under blankets, I can barely make out the text on the Voyage at brightness 3. I wouldn't say I can actually read it, much less comfortably. For that, I need 5. To see what the Oasis 2 looks like with black and white inverted at brightness 1 through 5, dim the display of these images until it matches a Voyage at brightness 3.

[JFHey]

Wow that looks great! Looks like Oasis 2 on brightness 1 inverted is perfectly readable at night with minimal light exposure - exactly what I was hoping for.
Thanks so much for this comparison j.p.s.!

I often start reading on my paper white with brightness 5 at night, and as it gets later (and I more tired) I gradually go down to brightness 1.But it's still relatively much light.
I think the night time reading experience on Oasis 2 will be much more pleasant.

[Shad Plante]

Thanks for the comparison photos. That inverted mode is the Oasis feature that is probably the most compelling to me. Figure I'll wait another year and hopefully there will be a Paperwhite with the feature.

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by JFHey

Wow that looks great! Looks like Oasis 2 on brightness 1 inverted is perfectly readable at night with minimal light exposure - exactly what I was hoping for.
Thanks so much for this comparison j.p.s.!

I often start reading on my paper white with brightness 5 at night, and as it gets later (and I more tired) I gradually go down to brightness 1.But it's still relatively much light.
I think the night time reading experience on Oasis 2 will be much more pleasant.

You're welcome, JFHey.

I'm sensitive to ghosting, so I always set for refresh every page. If I start reading in inverted black and white mode I'll probably turn that off. The flash is a bit disconcerting.

[DuckieTigger]

Originally Posted by j.p.s

You're welcome, JFHey.

I'm sensitive to ghosting, so I always set for refresh every page. If I start reading in inverted black and white mode I'll probably turn that off. The flash is a bit disconcerting.

Is the flash in inverted also inverted? So rather than a flash to black it is a flash to white? That would be aweful.

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by DuckieTigger

Is the flash in inverted also inverted? So rather than a flash to black it is a flash to white? That would be aweful.

Yes, it flashes to white. There is speculation that inverted black and white on the Oasis 2 is done in hardware instead of software. That may be the reason for the flash to white. At first I thought, of course that is the nature of refresh. But you raise a very good point, flashing to black should work as well or better as a refresh in inverted mode and would be strongly preferable for reading in the dark.

Since this is an accessibility feature, the flash to white is the most harmful to the people that need, rather than prefer, the inverted black and white mode.

If inverted black and white mode is implemented in hardware, maybe it was slightly cheaper to flash to white or the designer just didn't think it through. Same for software.

Also if it is done in hardware, maybe being done in hardware allows the black to be more even, but I think flashing to black would work just as well.

[DuckieTigger]

No, makes sense to have it flash to white. In hardware it makes a difference - a discharge will take a different time than charging. Also either one of them may not be perfect (leaving residue resulting in ghosting).

In normal mode it is easier to switch white to black, but hard to switch black to white, thus ghosting appears in the background. Other than polarity, the eink should care less what is considered black and white. So very possible to simply invert polarity and leave everything the same.

If it wasn't necessary, I think someone would already flash to white in normal mode to disappear the text and replace with new.

Depending on how fast the leds can be controlled and react, maybe a software fix can be made to turn the leds off during flash in inverted.

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by DuckieTigger

Depending on how fast the leds can be controlled and react, maybe a software fix can be made to turn the leds off during flash in inverted.

Well, who knows how Lab126 goes about things, but LEDs are very fast to turn on and off. Many devices control LED brightness with PWM and even 45 years ago HP pocket calculators had single line red 7 segment LED displays that only lit 1 segment at a time to save power. That is about 1% duty cycle for each segment. Most people saw a steady display, but some could see the flicker.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by j.p.s

Yes, it flashes to white. There is speculation that inverted black and white on the Oasis 2 is done in hardware instead of software. That may be the reason for the flash to white. At first I thought, of course that is the nature of refresh. But you raise a very good point, flashing to black should work as well or better as a refresh in inverted mode and would be strongly preferable for reading in the dark.

Not sure if this has changed but last time I looked at eInk's specifications, the ghost removal is a three step process in which every pixel is written to white, then to black and finally to white again. Much more noticeable when the screen is basically black in inverted mode.

Personal option in inverted mode is refresh every page since I find the ghosting is much more visible than in normal mode.

Originally Posted by DuckieTigger

Depending on how fast the leds can be controlled and react, maybe a software fix can be made to turn the leds off during flash in inverted.

Given the speed with which most LEDs can be controlled compared to the speed of an eInk screen, it should be possible to have the LEDs turn off during the screen refresh. Very easy to say when I'm not going to have to do the programming.

[j.p.s]

I've taken another shot at accurate images of the Oasis 2 in inverted black and white mode in a dark room. I've set the Voyage brightness at 6, reduced exposure to 0.5 seconds and ISO from 800 to 200. Oasis 2 brightnesses are again 1 - 5. The Voyage looks very close to what I see in the dark. On my monitor, the Oasis looks a little darker than I see live, on a Samsung tablet, the Oasis is almost invisible on the lowest brightness and somewhat dim at the highest brightnesses.I think these pictures show that the Oasis gets dark enough in inverted mode for anyone that reads on the Voyage at brightness 6 or more.

[shalym]

Originally Posted by j.p.s

I've taken another shot at accurate images of the Oasis 2 in inverted black and white mode in a dark room. I've set the Voyage brightness at 6, reduced exposure to 0.5 seconds and ISO from 800 to 200. Oasis 2 brightnesses are again 1 - 5. The Voyage looks very close to what I see in the dark. On my monitor, the Oasis looks a little darker than I see live, on a Samsung tablet, the Oasis is almost invisible on the lowest brightness and somewhat dim at the highest brightnesses.I think these pictures show that the Oasis gets dark enough in inverted mode for anyone that reads on the Voyage at brightness 6 or more.

Can you actually read at any of those settings? If so, I guess my eyes are worse than I thought, as I can just barely make out a few words on the Voyage at that light level, and on the Oasis, it doesn't look like there is anything at all on the screen until the last image, when I can make out a few words.

Shari

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by shalym

Can you actually read at any of those settings? If so, I guess my eyes are worse than I thought, as I can just barely make out a few words on the Voyage at that light level, and on the Oasis, it doesn't look like there is anything at all on the screen until the last image, when I can make out a few words.

Shari

Since you have both a Voyage and an Oasis 2, I'm not sure whether you are asking about the actual devices in a dark room or the images I posted.

For the images I posted, it is very dependent on the computer screen and somewhat dependent on the light level in the room. In general, I think the pictures in post #19 are significantly brighter than on the actual kindles, so I made the pictures in post #28 but maybe went too far the other way. On my computer monitor, post #28 Voyage images are comfortably readable and the Oasis images are hard to read until about the third one and the brightest two are fine. On my Samsung tablet, the Voyage images are also OK, but the slightest glare completely washes out the darker Oasis images, which are also hard to even see in a dark room. The brighter Oasis images are readable, but tiring.

For the actual devices, the Voyage is comfortable for me at brightness 6 in a completely dark room, brightness 3 is perfectly readable, but tiring. In normal mode, the Oasis is readable at 1, but I prefer 2 or 3. In inverted mode, 1 is readable, but very tiring, 2 a bit better, and 3 comfortable.

Since you read your Voyage at brightness 11, it is not surprising that the post #28 images are too dark to read. On the devices I viewed them, they are significantly darker than the actual devices, which get pretty dark as it is. But for me, the post 19 images are quite a bit brighter than the actual devices.