A method for controlling an electroluminescent display to produce an image for display that has reduced luminance to reduce burn-in on the display while maintaining visible contrast, comprising: (a) providing the electroluminescent, EL, display comprising a plurality of EL emitters, the luminance of the light produced by each EL emitter being responsive to a respective drive signal; (b) receiving (4, 52) a respective input image signal for each EL emitter; and (c) transforming the input image signals to a plurality of drive signals that have a reduced peak frame luminance value but maintains contrast in the displayed image to reduce burn-in by adjusting the drive signals to have reduced luminance provided by each pixel with the luminance decrease in a shadow range being less than the luminance decrease in a non-shadow range, wherein the shadow range includes lower input image signals corresponding to a lower luminance than the non-shadow range, wherein step (c) includes: determining whether the image is static or dynamic based on a comparison of average intensity values of consecutive data frames, and determining a peak frame luminance value, when the image is static based on a time the static image is presented on the display, by holding a peak frame luminance constant for i frames after the static image is displayed, reducing the peak frame luminance by a first exponential function until a time F s, and, once F s is achieved, reducing the peak frame luminance by a second exponential function, determining a contrast function which is a transform mapping the input image signals to the drive signals as a function of the peak frame luminance value, wherein the contrast function is applied to the input image signals to obtain output image signals based on which the drive signals are provided (8, 60) to the display for the emitters to produce the reduced peak frame luminance value, and wherein a relationship between the input image signal and the luminance provided by the display is linear for luminance values greater than 20% of the peak frame luminance value and nonlinear for values less than 5% of the peak frame luminance value. (a) providing the electroluminescent, EL, display comprising a plurality of EL emitters, the luminance of the light produced by each EL emitter being responsive to a respective drive signal; (b) receiving (4, 52) a respective input image signal for each EL emitter; and (c) transforming the input image signals to a plurality of drive signals that have a reduced peak frame luminance value but maintains contrast in the displayed image to reduce burn-in by adjusting the drive signals to have reduced luminance provided by each pixel with the luminance decrease in a shadow range being less than the luminance decrease in a non-shadow range, wherein the shadow range includes lower input image signals corresponding to a lower luminance than the non-shadow range, wherein step (c) includes: determining whether the image is static or dynamic based on a comparison of average intensity values of consecutive data frames, and determining a peak frame luminance value, when the image is static based on a time the static image is presented on the display, by holding a peak frame luminance constant for i frames after the static image is displayed, reducing the peak frame luminance by a first exponential function until a time F s, and, once F s is achieved, reducing the peak frame luminance by a second exponential function, determining a contrast function which is a transform mapping the input image signals to the drive signals as a function of the peak frame luminance value, wherein the contrast function is applied to the input image signals to obtain output image signals based on which the drive signals are provided (8, 60) to the display for the emitters to produce the reduced peak frame luminance value, and wherein a relationship between the input image signal and the luminance provided by the display is linear for luminance values greater than 20% of the peak frame luminance value and nonlinear for values less than 5% of the peak frame luminance value. determining whether the image is static or dynamic based on a comparison of average intensity values of consecutive data frames, and determining a peak frame luminance value, when the image is static based on a time the static image is presented on the display, by holding a peak frame luminance constant for i frames after the static image is displayed, reducing the peak frame luminance by a first exponential function until a time F s, and, once F s is achieved, reducing the peak frame luminance by a second exponential function, determining a contrast function which is a transform mapping the input image signals to the drive signals as a function of the peak frame luminance value, wherein the contrast function is applied to the input image signals to obtain output image signals based on which the drive signals are provided (8, 60) to the display for the emitters to produce the reduced peak frame luminance value, and wherein a relationship between the input image signal and the luminance provided by the display is linear for luminance values greater than 20% of the peak frame luminance value and nonlinear for values less than 5% of the peak frame luminance value.