Animation Magazine Raves About the VP3881

ViewSonic VP3881

I’ve been itching to try out one of the new curved monitors to see if they are all that they are cracked up to be. I’m happy to report that yes, indeed, they are all that they are cracked up to be.

The ViewSonic 38” VP3881 is one of these monitors — and it’s a little bit dreamy. (Full disclosure: I haven’t put it through rigorous technical tests, checking the limits of the display — so I’m really going off of user experience and practicality.)

Firstly, the wide 21:9 aspect ratio (3840 x 1600) with a curve that encroaches into your peripheral vision just feels natural. The seamless work area is a nice change from my two-monitor setup, where you end up delegating tasks more heavily to one monitor or the other. At least that’s me. I can still break apart my work area expanding Nuke into Viewing Window, Nodes and Parameters, for example. But the environment feels more cohesive. Plus, there is support software to split your workspace into discrete areas, for those of us who are more particular.

The display itself is crisp and deep, displaying 4.39 trillion colors with HDR10 support (I hope to see Dolby Vision support in the future). That means that you are going to have brighter brights and darker darks than what you’ve been getting in your older monitors. And with a projected Delta E≦2 color accuracy, the monitor should be more than adequate for color sensitive tasks like compositing, editing and color grading.

SideNote: Delta E is the comparative difference between two colors (not touching each other) that should be the same. A Delta E of 1 is imperceptible, while a Delta E between 3 and 6 is deemed acceptable. So E≦2 ain’t too shabby (understatement).

The color specs are listed on the delivery sheet that comes with the monitor. But for the critical color people, ViewSonic does have a “Colorbration Kit” available to ensure that your monitor stays plumb to the colors you expect.

The monitor sports a number of display inputs: DisplayPort, HDMI 2.0, and USB-c Thunderbolt — so, not only can you transmitter video and audio, but you can also charge your iPhone. There are also built-in speakers — which is a nice feature, but if you are an editing pro, you’ll know that you should probably have some pro speaks in your suite.

All in all, I have to confess that I’ve been broken by this monitor, or at least by 21:9 curved monitors in general. I don’t know if I can ever go back!