Colorization is a
computer-assisted process of adding color to a monochrome image or
movie. The process typically involves segmenting images into regions
and tracking these regions across image sequences. Neither of these
tasks can be performed reliably in practice; consequently, colorization
requires considerable user intervention and remains a tedious,
time-consuming, and expensive task. In this paper we present a simple colorization method that requires neither precise image segmentation, nor accurate region tracking. Our method is based on a simple premise: neighboring pixels in space-time that have similar intensities should have similar colors. We formalize this premise using a quadratic cost function and obtain an optimization problem that can be solved efficiently using standard techniques. In our approach an artist only needs to annotate the image with a few color scribbles, and the indicated colors are automatically propagated in both space and time to produce a fully colorized image or sequence. We demonstrate that high quality colorizations of stills and movie clips may be obtained from a relatively modest amount of user input.
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Clip 1: Crater Lake. 83 frames, 7 marked frames Click here for a QuickTime MPEG-4 movie. |
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grayscale clip
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Clip 2: Toddler. 43 frames, 5 marked frames Click here for a QuickTime MPEG-4 movie. |
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Clip 3:
Birthday. 62 frames, 10 marked frames Click here for a QuickTime MPEG-4 movie. |
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grayscale clip
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Clip 4: Driving. 33 frames, 9 marked frames Click here for a QuickTime MPEG-4 movie. |
Input grayscale clip |
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Colorized clip |