HDR represents the greatest leap in in-game image quality since the advent of Anti-Aliasing. It adds depth and character to a game such that once you have played with HDR enabled for a period of time, switching it off reveals a flat, dull scenery and lifeless characters. So what exactly is HDR and what does it mean? Paul Debevec, a graphics researcher from the University of Southern California, is seen as the Father of HDR, and world expert in the field.

"The 'dynamic range' of a scene is the contrast ratio between its brightest and darkest parts," he told us. "A plate of evenly-lit mashed potatoes outside on a cloudy day is low-dynamic range. The interior of an ornate cathedral with light streaming in through its stained-glass windows is high dynamic range. In fact, any scene in which the light sources can be seen directly is high dynamic range."

A High-Dynamic Range image is an image that has a greater contrast range than can be shown on a standard display device, or that can be captured with a standard camera with just a single exposure.

Current TFT monitors have a typical contrast ratio of 400:1, and even the most expensive models can only boast 1000:1. This means that in any given scene, the colour value or brightness of the darkest pixel can only be one thousandth of the value of the brightest pixel. This may sound like a lot, but in the real world, the dynamic range of the human eye is measured not in the hundreds, but in hundreds of thousands or more.