A display has a spatial light modulator (10) for dynamically controlling a luminance of each pixel according to an input signal, the spatial light modulator having a non uniform spatial characteristic, the display also having an optical filter (20) having a spatial pattern to alter the luminance to compensate at least partially for the non uniform spatial characteristic. An electronic signal processing element applies some pre compensation predominantly of higher spatial frequencies for the non uniform spatial characteristic. Such dynamic and optical compensation can enable tuning for different optimizations or for compensating for variations over time. A backlight has an optical source and an optical filter, the source having a color output which has a non uniform spatial characteristic, and the optical filter having a spatial pattern to alter the color to compensate in part at least for the non uniform spatial characteristic.