System and method for processing images to emulate film tonescale and color

1. A method for converting a sequence of scan-only film captured images into a sequence of modified images providing the appearance of images captured by a photographic film reproduction system; the photographic film reproduction system being of the type that includes photographic motion picture negative film printed onto a motion picture print film that is displayed, or a reversal motion picture system in which the reversal film is displayed, or a photographic motion picture film electro-optically scanned to standard format video by a telecine and further displayed, or a photographic motion picture film electro-optically scanned by a scanner suitable for producing digital data intended for additional digital image manipulation and further preparation as a digital master for electronic distribution such as digital theatrical projection or various types of broadcast video; or recorded out to another photographic film to be used as a printing master for producing distribution optical prints for theatrical projection, said method comprising the steps of:

a) photographically capturing a sequence of images on a scan-only film;

b) chemically processing the scan-only film to produce photographic film images;

c) electro-optically scanning the processed photographic film images to produce electronic images in either video or data formats;

d) transforming scan-only film captured image video or data into signals representative of the scan-only film's optical scanning densities;

e) transforming the scan-only film's optical densities with a linear function that represents the film's interimage interlayer effects to produce uncorrelated color optical density data;

f) transforming the scan-only film's uncorrelated color optical densities with a non-linear function that emulates the film's uncorrelated characteristic density response to scene exposure to produce linearized exposure data and neutral-corrected scan-only film captured images;

g) transforming the neutral-corrected scan-only film captured images with a linear function that emulates a film exposure of the film reproduction system to produce exposure-corrected scan-only film captured images;

h) transforming the exposure-corrected scan-only film captured images with a non-linear function that renders the exposure-corrected scan-only film captured images with a tone scale of the film reproduction system to produce tonescale-corrected scan-only film captured images; and

i) transforming the tonescale-corrected scan-only film captured images with a linear function that emulates a film color look provided by the film reproduction system to produce modified images that provide the appearance of an image that had been captured with the film reproduction system, and wherein the above transforming steps are referenced to scanned film densities of a photographic film used in the photographic film reproduction system.

2. The method as claimed in claim 1 wherein the steps of photographically capturing a sequence of images with a scan-only film and electro-optically scanning the chemically processed scan-only film images to produce scan-only film captured image data or video, and b) transforming the scan-only film captured image data or video into linearized exposure data includes providing the linearized exposure data from the scan-only film used to capture a sequence of motion images.

3. The method as claimed in claim 1 wherein a three-dimensional lookup table represents a transform function described in a combination of consecutive steps or any single step.

4. The method as claimed in claim 1 further comprising the step of recording the modified images on film.

5. The method as claimed in claim 1 further comprising the step of displaying the modified images with a display.

6. The method as claimed in claim 5 in which the display is either

(a) an electro-optical display including at least one of a digital projector, a television display, a video projector, a liquid crystal display or a laser projector; or

(b) retinal projection or (c) an electro-optic mechanism.

7. The method as claimed in claim 1 in which the modified images are further transformed to standard format video signals suitable for television.

8. The method as claimed in claim 7 wherein a three-dimensional lookup table represents a transform function described in a combination of consecutive steps or any single step.

9. The method as in claim 7 in which the display is either (a) an electro-optical display including at least one of a digital projector, a television display, a video projector, a liquid crystal display or a laser projector; or (b) retinal projection or (c) an electro-optic mechanism.

10. The method as claimed in claim 1 wherein the modified images are color-balanced before subsequent utilization by balancing a reference neutral to a predetermined scanner density value.

11. The method as claimed in claim 10 wherein a three-dimensional lookup table represents a transform function described in a combination of consecutive steps or any single step.

12. The method as claimed in claim 10 further comprising the step of recording the modified images on film.

13. The method as claimed in claim 10 further comprising the step of displaying the modified images on a display.

14. The method as claimed in claim 13 in which the display is either (a) an electro-optical display including at least one of a digital projector, a television display, a video projector, a liquid crystal display or a laser projector; or (b) retinal projection or (c) an electro-optic mechanism.

15. The method as claimed in claim 10 in which the modified images are further transformed to standard format video signals suitable for television.

16. The method as claimed in claim 15 wherein a three-dimensional lookup table represents a transform function described in a combination of consecutive steps or any single step.

17. The method as in claim 15 in which the display is either (a) an electro-optical display including at least one of a digital projector, a television display, a video projector, a liquid crystal display or a laser projector; or (b) retinal projection or (c) an electro-optic mechanism.

18. The method as claimed in claim 1 wherein the step of transforming scan-only film captured image video or data into signals representative of the film's optical scanning densities is performed with image processing that reverses signal processing of any electro-optical scanning device.

19. The method as claimed in claim 1 wherein the step of transforming the scan-only film optical densities with a linear function that represents the film's interimage interlayer effects to produce uncorrelated color optical density data is performed with a color matrix generated by characterizing the interlayer interimage effects of the scan-only film.

20. The method as claimed in claim 1 wherein the step of transforming the scan-only film uncorrelated color optical densities with a non-linear function is performed with a look up table that is determined by mapping the exposure-corrected scan-only film exposures to channel-independent printing densities corresponding to the scanned film densities of the scan-only film to obtain neutral-corrected scan-only film captured images.

21. The method as claimed in claim 1 wherein the step of transforming the neutral-corrected scan-only film captured images with a linear function that emulates a film exposure of the photographic film reproduction system is performed with a matrix that is determined by regressing the neutrally-corrected scan-only film exposures against the photographic film exposures to obtain exposure-corrected scan-only film exposures.

22. The method as claimed in claim 12 wherein the step of transforming the exposure-corrected scan-only film captured images with a non-linear function that renders the exposure-corrected scan-only film captured images with a tone scale of the photographic film reproduction system is performed by a look up table that is determined by mapping the exposure-corrected scan-only film exposures to channel-independent printing densities corresponding to the scanned film densities to obtain tonescale-corrected scene film density values.

23. The method as claimed in claim 13 wherein the step of transforming the tonescale-corrected scene film density values with a linear function that emulates a photographic film color look provided by the photographic film reproduction system is performed with a matrix that is determined by characterizing the interimage interlayer effects of a photographic film.

24. A method for converting a sequence of scan-only film captured images into a sequence of modified images providing the appearance of images captured by a photographic film reproduction system; the photographic film reproduction system being of the type that includes photographic motion picture negative film printed onto a motion picture print film that is displayed, or a reversal motion picture system in which the reversal film is displayed, or a photographic motion picture film electro-optically scanned to standard format video by a telecine and further displayed, or a photographic motion picture film electro-optically scanned by a scanner suitable for producing digital data intended for additional digital image manipulation and further preparation as a digital master for electronic distribution such as digital theatrical projection or various types of broadcast video; or recorded out to another

photographic film to be used as a printing master for producing distribution optical prints for theatrical projection, said method comprising the steps of:

a) photographically capturing a sequence of images on a scan-only film;

b) chemically processing the scan-only film to produce photographic film images;

c) electro-optically scanning the processed photographic film images to produce electronic images in either video or data formats;

d) transforming scan-only film captured image video or data into signals representative of the scan-only film's optical scanning densities;

e) transforming the scan-only film's optical densities with a linear function that represents the film's interimage interlayer effects to produce uncorrelated color optical density data;

f) transforming the scan-only film's uncorrelated color optical densities with a non-linear function that emulates the film's uncorrelated characteristic density response to scene exposure to produce linearized exposure data and neutral-corrected scan-only film captured images;

g) transforming the neutral-corrected scan-only film captured images with a non-linear function that renders the exposure-corrected scan-only film captured images with a tone scale of the film reproduction system to produce tonescale-corrected scan-only film captured images; and

h) transforming the tonescale-corrected scan-only film captured images with a linear function that emulates a film color look provided by the film reproduction system to produce modified images that provide the appearance of an image that had been captured with the film reproduction system, and wherein the above transforming steps are referenced to scanned film densities of a photographic film used in the photographic film reproduction system.

25. The method as claimed in claim 24 further comprising the step of providing linearized exposure data from a scan-only film used to capture the sequence of motion images for steps a), c), and d) above.

26. The method as claimed in claim 24 wherein a three-dimensional lookup table represents a transform function described in a combination of consecutive steps or any single step.

27. The method as claimed in claim 24 further comprising the step of recording the modified images on film.

28. The method as claimed in claim 24 further comprising the step of displaying the modified images with a display.

29. The method as claimed in claim 28 in which the display is either (a) an electro-optical display including at least one of a digital projector, a television display, a video projector, a liquid crystal display or a laser projector; or (b) retinal projection or (c) an electro-optic mechanism.

30. The method as claimed in claim 24 in which the modified images are further transformed to standard format video signals suitable for television.

31. The method as claimed in claim 30 wherein a three-dimensional lookup table represents a transform function described in a combination of consecutive steps or any single step.

32. The method as in claim 30 in which the display is either (a) an electro-optical display including at least one of a digital projector, a television display, a video projector, a liquid crystal display or a laser projector; or (b) retinal projection or (c) an electro-optic mechanism.

33. The method as claimed in claim 24 wherein the modified images are color-balanced before subsequent utilization by balancing a reference neutral to a predetermined scanner density value to obtain modified images.

34. The method as claimed in claim 33 wherein a three-dimensional lookup table represents a transform function described in a combination of consecutive steps or any single step.

35. The method as claimed in claim 33 further comprising the step of recording the modified images on film.

36. The method as claimed in claim 33 further comprising the step of displaying the modified images on a display.

37. The method as claimed in claim 36 in which the display is either (a) an electro-optical display including at least one of a digital projector, a television display, a video projector, a liquid crystal display or a laser projector; or (b) retinal projection or (c) an electro-optic mechanism.

38. The method as claimed in claim 33 in which the modified images are further transformed to standard format video signals suitable for television.

39. The method as claimed in claim 38 wherein a three-dimensional lookup table represents a transform function described in a combination of consecutive steps or any single step.

40. The method as in claim 38 in which the display is either (a) an electro-optical display including at least one of a digital projector, a television display, a video projector, a liquid crystal display or a laser projector; or (b) retinal projection or (c) an electro-optic mechanism.

41. A system for converting a sequence of scan-only film captured images into a sequence of modified images providing the appearance of images captured by a photographic film reproduction system; the photographic film reproduction system being of the type that includes photographic motion picture negative film printed onto a motion picture print film that is displayed, or a reversal motion picture system in which the reversal film is displayed, or a photographic motion picture film electro-optically scanned to standard format video by a telecine and further displayed, or a photographic motion picture film electro-optically scanned by a scanner suitable for producing digital data intended for additional digital image manipulation and further preparation as a digital master for electronic distribution such as digital theatrical projection or various types of broadcast video; or recorded out to another photographic film to be used as a printing master for producing distribution optical prints for theatrical projection, said system comprising:

a) a scan-only film for capturing a sequence of images;

b) a chemical processor for processing the film;

c) an electro-optical scanner for scanning the processed film images and obtaining electronic images in either video or data formats;

d) a processor for converting the scan-only film captured image video or data into signals representative of the film's optical scanning densities;

e) a first linear processor for transforming the scan-only film optical densities with a linear function that represents the film's interimage interlayer effects to produce uncorrelated color optical density data;

f) a first non-linear processor for transforming the scan-only film uncorrelated color optical densities with a non-linear function that emulates the film's uncorrelated characteristic density response to scene exposure to produce linearized exposure data that yields neutral-corrected scan-only film captured images;

g) a second linear processor for transforming the neutral-corrected scan-only film captured images with a linear function that emulates a film exposure of the film reproduction system to produce exposure-corrected scan-only film captured images;

h) a second non-linear processor for transforming the exposure-corrected scan-only film captured images with a non-linear function that renders the exposure-corrected scan-only film captured images with a tone scale of the photographic film reproduction system to produce tonescale-corrected scene film density values; and

i) a third linear processor for transforming the tonescale-corrected scene film density values with a linear function that emulates a film color look provided by the photographic film reproduction system, resulting in modified images that provide the appearance of an image captured with the photographic film reproduction system, wherein the transformation steps are referenced to scanned film densities of a film used in the photographic film reproduction system.

42. The system as claimed in claim 41 wherein the first and second non-linear processors employ look up tables and the first, second, and third linear processors employ matrices.

43. The system as claimed in claim 41 wherein a three-dimensional lookup table represents a transform function described in a combination of consecutive steps or any single step.

44. The system as claimed in claim 41 further comprising a film recorder for recording the modified images on film.

45. The system as claimed in claim 41 further comprising a display for displaying the modified images.

46. The system as claimed in claim 45 in which the display comprises either (a) an electro-optical display including at least one of a digital projector, a television display, a video projector, a liquid crystal display or a laser projector; or (b) retinal projection or (c) an electro-optic mechanism.

47. The system as claimed in claim 41 in which the modified images are further transformed to standard format video signals suitable for television.

48. The method as claimed in claim 47 wherein a three-dimensional lookup table represents a transform function described in a combination of consecutive steps or any single step.

49. The system as in claim 47 in which the display comprises either (a) an electro-optical display including at least one of a digital projector, a television display, a video projector, a liquid crystal display or a laser projector; or (b) retinal projection or (c) an electro-optic mechanism.

50. The system as claimed in claim 41 further comprising a color timer stage for color-balancing the modified images before their subsequent utilization by balancing a reference neutral to a predetermined scanner density value to produce modified images.

51. The method as claimed in claim 50 wherein a three-dimensional lookup table represents a transform function described in a combination of consecutive steps or any single step.

52. The system as claimed in claim 50 further comprising a recorder for recording the modified images on film.

53. The system as claimed in claim 50 further comprising a display for displaying the modified images.

54. The system as in claim 53 in which the display comprises either (a) an electro-optical display including at least one of a digital projector, a television display, a video projector, a liquid crystal display or a laser projector; or (b) retinal projection or (c) an electro-optic mechanism.

55. The system as claimed in claim 50 in which the modified images are further transformed to standard format video signals suitable for television.

56. The method as claimed in claim 55 wherein a three-dimensional lookup table represents a transform function described in a combination of consecutive steps or any single step.

57. The system as in claim 55 in which the display comprises either (a) an electro-optical display including at least one of a digital projector, a television display, a video projector, a liquid crystal display or a laser projector; or (b) retinal projection or (c) an electro-optic mechanism.