A method for improving liquid crystal spatial light modulator (10) uniformity is disclosed wherein an original code value (40) is obtained for a first pixel and a conditioned code value (50) is assigned to the first pixel. The conditioned code value is determined by characterizing the luminance response of a sample pixel of the spatial light modulator and defining an interpolation zone (18) for code values bounded between a minimum luminance code value and a threshold code value (16) for the sample pixel. The threshold value corresponds to a luminance level at which there is a generally linear relationship of luminance to code values. If the original code value lies within the interpolation zone, an interpolated value is calculated as the conditioned code value. The pixel of the spatial light modulator is modulated according to the conditioned code value.