Software to turn BW into color?

[CCericola]

Yes
Colorize Black and White Photos using Recolored

 

[Ilovemycam]

Sure, not looking for the real colors. Just a half ass thing. Blue sky and flesh color. If something was off color, click on it for a pallet of colors to choose from.

Software should be able to figure sky, people, maybe grass, streets. buildings, cars. Don't like a blue car, click on it for red or pink. But software would give you something to start with.

Sounds like you've identified a niche market. Start writing the script and fill it. In no time, you'll be hobnobbing with the Vanderbilts and lunching with Gates.

What Sparky is saying is that it is an enormously difficult problem that is only handled at this time by dedicated hardware and software issues that can do sophisticated pattern matching.
A computer would have to isolate something from a digital image and match it against a pattern for all possible items in every possible configuration.

Not simple or easy - even with dedicated fast hardware on a limited set of potential items in the field of view.
With no limit of what is in the field from grass to cats to airplanes, the number of patterns that would need to be scanned is astronomical.

I don't know. I'm not much of a computer guy. Was just asking and hoping something was out there. I figured if they could do it with movies, then still pictures should not be that hard.

 

[Ilovemycam]

Yes
Colorize Black and White Photos using Recolored

Hey, that looks nice. Will check it out.

Thanks!

 

[480sparky]

........ I figured if they could do it with movies, then still pictures should not be that hard.

It's still done manually with movies. Some human must tell the computer, 'This is a shirt, color it this shade of yellow. This is the sky, make it this shade of blue. Here is a car.... color it red.'

 

[nycphotography]

Sure, not looking for the real colors. Just a half ass thing. Blue sky and flesh color. If something was off color, click on it for a pallet of colors to choose from.

Software should be able to figure sky, people, maybe grass, streets. buildings, cars. Don't like a blue car, click on it for red or pink. But software would give you something to start with.

Sounds like you've identified a niche market. Start writing the script and fill it. In no time, you'll be hobnobbing with the Vanderbilts and lunching with Gates.

What Sparky is saying is that it is an enormously difficult problem that is only handled at this time by dedicated hardware and software issues that can do sophisticated pattern matching.
A computer would have to isolate something from a digital image and match it against a pattern for all possible items in every possible configuration.

Not simple or easy - even with dedicated fast hardware on a limited set of potential items in the field of view.
With no limit of what is in the field from grass to cats to airplanes, the number of patterns that would need to be scanned is astronomical.

That said...

How DID they colorize "It's a wonderful life"? 130 minutes at 24fpx = 187,200 frames. Even if they paid the labor to color each frame individually, how did they keep the colors consistent across multiple frames? I was always curious how they managed to do it... this just reminded me that I never found out.

 

[The_Traveler]

The Internet is your friend

HowStuffWorks "How do they color old black-and-white movies?"
Film colorization - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I quote from the Wikipedia article

A major difficulty with this process is its labor-intensity. For example, in order to colorize a still image an artist typically begins by dividing the image into regions, and then assigning a color to each region. This approach, also known as the segmentation method, is time consuming, as the process of dividing the picture into correct segments is painstaking. This problem occurs mainly because there have been no fully automatic algorithms to identify fuzzy or complex region boundaries, such as between a subject’s hair and face. Colorization of moving images also requires tracking regions as movement occurs from one frame to the next (motion compensation).

It all starts with a human doing work.

 

[fjrabon]

heck, computers can barely identify an object as a whole thing. ie 'magic lasso' doesn't even consistently work for selecting a part of an image as a single thing. Then you add in the problem of not only figuring out what is what, but also figuring out what it is, and thus what color it should be.

To solve this problem, you'd have to solve a lot of artificial intelligence problems what are VASTLY more important than colorizing B&W photos. That would be sort of like if Newton/Leibniz had invented calculus to figure out how to properly toast bread.

 

[480sparky]

.......... That would be sort of like if Newton/Leibniz had invented calculus to figure out how to properly toast bread.

 

[nycphotography]

Soooo.....

I found this cool collection of molested materpieces...

19 Legendary Black & White Photos Colorized Using Photoshop

with this picture...

http://cdn.bitrebels.netdna-cdn.com...Legendary-Photos-Colorized-In-Photoshop-9.jpg

Anyone knows who / what / where / why this picture is? I've seen it before, but I can't place it.

 

[table1349]

Sounds like you've identified a niche market. Start writing the script and fill it. In no time, you'll be hobnobbing with the Vanderbilts and lunching with Gates.

What Sparky is saying is that it is an enormously difficult problem that is only handled at this time by dedicated hardware and software issues that can do sophisticated pattern matching.
A computer would have to isolate something from a digital image and match it against a pattern for all possible items in every possible configuration.

Not simple or easy - even with dedicated fast hardware on a limited set of potential items in the field of view.
With no limit of what is in the field from grass to cats to airplanes, the number of patterns that would need to be scanned is astronomical.

I don't know. I'm not much of a computer guy. Was just asking and hoping something was out there. I figured if they could do it with movies, then still pictures should not be that hard.

If it was easy everyone would be doing it. COLORIZATION - The Museum of Broadcast Communications

 

[Helen B]

Soooo.....

I found this cool collection of molested materpieces...

19 Legendary Black & White Photos Colorized Using Photoshop

with this picture...

http://cdn.bitrebels.netdna-cdn.com...Legendary-Photos-Colorized-In-Photoshop-9.jpg

Anyone knows who / what / where / why this picture is? I've seen it before, but I can't place it.

That is Dorothy Counts, at Harding High School in Charlotte, NC. 1957.

 

[nycphotography]

Ahhh thank you.

 

[photoloverpp]

Yes
Colorize Black and White Photos using Recolored

Hey, that looks nice. Will check it out.

Thanks!

I've just tried this software, it has many colors of different body parts, but still need carefully handy control. and it's hard for me to work out a good colored photo, what I worked out was too fake...