Premium HDR: the impact of a single word on the quality of experience of HDR video

High Dynamic Range (HDR) visualization is converging towards a point where it becomes the de facto standard for multimedia services. Current and future variations in color bit depth, peak brightness, black level and all other characteristics of display and content ultimately lead to a fine-grained market of end-user products with a multitude of different capabilities and also numerous quality standards. Such identifiers and indicators may influence the Quality of Experience (QoE), as they create expectations and preconceptions regarding visual quality. In fact, sometimes even a single word may fundamentally affect user experience. In this paper, we investigate the labeling effect on HDR video QoE. We carried out a series of subjective tests where test participants compared unimpaired HDR videos. The trigger of the labeling effect was that one of the stimuli in the paired comparison was identified as Premium HDR. In order to gain more insight into the biased perception and experience, subjective assessment was separately performed for the different quality aspects of HDR visualization, such as luminance or color.