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No. 0488
Nov. 12, 1999
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
MITSUBISHI TO LAUNCH INDUSTRY-CHANGING
DIGITAL COLOR CONVERSION TECHNOLOGY AT COMDEX
The Revolutionary Technology to Enhance the Color Reproduction
Capabilities of LCD Desktop Monitors and Projectors
TOKYO, Nov. 12, 1999
-- Mitsubishi Electric Corporation, long-standing innovator of visual
display products and owner of DIAMONDTRON-NF™ Natural Flat
CRT technology, will shake up the computing industry at COMDEX (Nov.
15-19), with the announcement of its newest contribution to the
advancement of digital display products. Called by its code name,
MarveLA, the new technology is a solution to the problem inherent
in the quality of color reproduction in digitally controlled display
products such as LCD-TFT desktop monitors, LCD projectors, DLP™
projection systems, and field emission displays. Mitsubishi will
show a prototype using this ground-breaking technology, MarveLA,
to selected customers and media representatives at the COMDEX Fall
1999 in Las Vegas.
Recently, the industry has seen numerous display
technologies, such as LCD, LED, DLP™and PDP, replacing the conventional CRT. Up
to now, however, these have been considered insufficient in terms
of color reproduction capability due to the substantially limited
color space of these devices, compared to the more mature CRT technology.
With the advent of true multimedia applications and Internet commerce,
color reproduction limitations are likely to constrain the further
proliferation of LCD and other digital display devices into both
the office and home computing environment.
In an attempt to define the ideal color reproduction
requirement for multimedia imaging hardware and software, Microsoft
and Hewlett Packard are promoting a set of standard color profiles
for PC, display monitor, scanner, digital camera, and printer, called
sRGB. This new set of standard color profiles has recently been
established as a new international standard (IEC 61966-2-1) upon
which new hardware and software will be designed.
This new standard outlines the infrastructure for
a better defined, uniform and rich color environment and as for
display hardware products, a revolutionary digital signal processing
technology is a prerequisite to ensure that color picture images
remain true to the originals. Furthermore, as more and more applications
incorporate full moving pictures, this digital signal processing
technology has to be a real-time system that can process a substantially
large data size and one that can be designed into hardware.
Mitsubishi Electric has developed MarveLA, an algorithm
applied for patent, to meet the real-time demands of multimedia
applications and alleviate the problem of poor color definition
in digitally controlled display equipment. MarveLA is also compact
enough to be incorporated in an ASIC, so that superb color conversion
results can be obtained without overloading the CPU.
Patented Color Conversion Technology
Generally, there are two types of digital color
conversion technologies: the 3DLook-up Table method and the Matrix
Calculation method.
The advantage of the 3DLook-up Table method is
its ability to process very complex color conversion, however, this
is disadvantaged by requiring a large amount of memory to store
an enormous set of parameters. Because of this large memory requirement,
the 3DLook-Up Table method can only be used for still images - the
total circuit size that would be required for motion pictures would
be unrealistic.
The advantage of the Matrix Calculation method,
on the other hand, is that it does not require large-scale circuitry
to process motion pictures. The disadvantage with this method is
its limited ability to process complex color conversion tasks. Therefore,
the Matrix Calculation method is generally considered the preferred
option to fit multimedia applications.
Mitsubishi's new algorithm, MarveLA, offers solutions
to the disadvantages associated with the two methods and is capable
of bringing out considerable improvements in color quality, both
for still and moving pictures. MarveLA is a completely new algorithm
derived by Mitsubishi Electric based on the Matrix Computing method;
however, unlike the conventional 3 by 3 linear matrix or 3 by n
matrices, MarveLA is using Mitsubishi's new, proprietary Matrix
algorithm and therefore does not need a large-scale memory. Furthermore,
MarveLA enables adjustments to independent colors, unlike the conventional
method that forces color adjustments over an entire image.
What MarveLA Can Do for You
With this revolutionary new
technology in place, Mitsubishi can manufacture and market the world's
first flat panel display monitor that supports sRGB by using MarveLA.
Not only confined to sRGB, Mitsubishi engineers are also testing
MarveLA's potential with other standard color profiles such as ICM
and ColorSync™.
In addition, with MarveLA, users can control and
adjust a single color without affecting the hues of other colors.
For example, think of an image of a basket of fruit filled with
apples, oranges, bananas and lemons - MarveLA enables the user to
correct the color of the apple without effecting the colors of the
other fruit.
Mitsubishi Electric will incorporate this
technology into its own branded LCD-TFT monitors, LCD projectors,
DLP™projection
systems, and other digitally controlled display devices planned
for launch in the year 2000. Mitsubishi is also seeking OEM opportunities
with major IT corporations.
# # #
About Mitsubishi Electric Corporation
With more than 75 years of experience
in providing reliable, high-quality products to both corporate clients
and general consumers all over the world, Mitsubishi Electric Corporation
is a recognized world leader in the manufacture, marketing and sales
of electrical and electronic equipment used in information processing
and communications, space development and satellite communications,
consumer electronics, industrial technology, energy, transportation
and construction. With operations in 34 countries, Mitsubishi Electric
Corporation recorded consolidated group sales of over US$31 billion
in the year ended March 31, 1999. Additional information on Mitsubishi
Electric Corporation is available at global.mitsubishielectric.com
For further information:
(US)
Susie Mitchell Cover
Mitsubishi Electronics America - Display Products
714-236-6139 smitchellcover@itg.mea.com |
(Japan)
Matthew Nicholson
Mitsubishi Electric Corporation - Public Relations Dept.
+81-3-3218-2346 Matthew.Nicholson@hq.melco.co.jp |
(UK)
Megan Eaglesham
Mitsubishi Electric Europe - Display and Storage Div.
+44-(0)1707-282837 megan.eaglesham@meuk.mee.com |
(Germany)
Stefan Dammer
Mitsubishi Electric Europe - Information Systems Div.
+49-(0) 2102-486-393 stefan.dammer@meg.mee.com |
(France)
Michel Jacob
Mitsubishi Electric Europe - Peripheriques, France
+33(0)1-55-68-55-58 jacob@mef.mee.com |
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