Digital Photographer's Software Guide - Bertemes - Net

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The Digital Photographer's Software Guide
PhotoFlair
Vendor: TruView Imaging Company
Purpose: Revolutionary photo enhancement software based on the Retinex algorithm
Figure 20.1
PhotoFlair uses the Retinex algorithm for instant improvement of poorly exposed images.
Description
PhotoFlair has the ability to improve incorrectly exposed photographs with a single click.
If this sounds like hype, please read on, because this underrated product is the real thing:
a technology based on the almost subversive insights of the late Dr. Edwin Lang, the
inventor of Polaroid photography. He rightly supposed that color perception is a combination
of the eye’s retina (“retin-”) and the brain’s visual cortex (“-ex”), and he called
his theory of two-channel processing the Retinex theory.
Many years passed before NASA developed retinex algorithms that simulated the effects
of Dr. Land’s experimental Retinex filters. These algorithms, which have been used to
enhance space images, are now being marketed by a commercial firm as the PhotoFlair
package. It is ideal for restoring detail in old photographs that have been digitally
scanned. It also has forensic applications, enhancing images from surveillance tapes.
PhotoFlair’s features in addition to Retinex include a levels dialog box for adjusting red,
green, and blue channels and a composite channel, histogram equalization, gamma,
sharpen, blur, despeckle, edge detection, three types of image resizing algorithm (pixel
replication, gaussian, and cubic interpolation), cropping, grayscale conversion, and
image rotation.