How to implement old film effect?

Question

Hello, I'd like to implement an old film effect on pictures. Does anyone know a library or even the rare maths involved? I'd like it to cope with red shift for over-exposition and the rest. Even if you don't know the maths or a library, a pointer to any technical doc will be appreciated.

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Clarification: I need to write these routines for a project of my own. I'd like to know what kind of processing has to be done and how. Doesn't matter the environment and system, I just need some hint on how process RGB data

Answer 1

You could try with as3 bitmapdata noise function http://livedocs.adobe.com/flash/9.0/ActionScriptLangRefV3/flash/display/BitmapData.html#noise%28%29

Answer 2

If you can find a plugin for Paint.Net, I'm sure you could just use that dll in your program. Is this the sort of thing you're looking for?

Answer 3

Rare maths?

Create several different transparent PNGs with scratch and dust marks on it. Take a pic, adjust the hue, saturation and brightness (algorithms for this aren't that complex) to fade out the pic, then overlay one to many of the scratchy PNGs. The more scratch/dust PNGs you have, the more random the effect you can create.

Not much math here IMHO.

Answer 4

You mention Magic Bullet from Red Giant Software in your comments. There's an impressive amount of image processing know-how behind the development of Magic Bullet. You'd probably have an easier time implementing a host interface for After Effects or Final Cut Pro plug-ins and using Magic Bullet.

If you want to see some source code in action, examine the open source projects that do image processing like GIMP, CinePaint, FreeFrame, etc.