The major new technology that Sony demonstrated at the PlayStation meeting yesterday was not 4K, as many may have expected, but HDR- which legitimately looks like it will greatly enhance visual fidelity across the board for everybody who owns a PS4. And the best thing is, everyone gets HDR- Sony will be updating old PS4 consoles with HDR capability with a free firmware update later this year, too.
Speaking after the PlayStation Meeting, Sony’s Shawn Layden discussed HDR, and what it can do for storytelling.
“Talking about getting emotion into your story, and showing people exactly what the feeling of your characters are, I think HDR brings that capability right across the board to everything you do,” he said. “You saw with Days Gone, you saw the reflection of the light against Deacon’s face, and how he has the horde coming against him. HDR is one more… it’s like taking your color palette from 64 crayons to 4 million. It’s fantastic. We think it’s gonna be huge for the creators and the medium, and we couldn’t be more excited.”
I agree with him on HDR- while it’s not a leap on the level of 8-bit, 16-bit, 3D, or HD graphics, it is definitely something substantial, and it’s importance can absolutely not be downplayed.