OpenEXR is a high dynamic-range (HDR) image file format developed by Industrial Light & Magic for use in computer imaging applications.
The format has 16-bit floating-point color component values, supports 32-bit unsigned integer and 32-bit floating-point data types, and several lossless compression methods.
It’s released under an open source license.
It provides the following tools:
- exrheader, a utility for dumping header information.
- exrstdattr, a utility for modifying OpenEXR standard attributes.
- exrmaketiled, for generating tiled and rip/mipmapped images.
- exrenvmap, for creating OpenEXR environment maps.
- exrmakepreview, for creating preview images for OpenEXR files.
- exrdisplay, a sample application for viewing OpenEXR images on a display at various exposure settings.
- IlmImf, a library that reads and writes OpenEXR images.
- Half, a C++ class for manipulating half values as if they were a built-in C++ data type.
- Imath, a math library with support for matrices, 2d- and 3d-transformations, solvers for linear/quadratic/cubic equations, and more.
Features include:
- Higher dynamic range and colour precision than existing 8- and 10-bit image file formats.
- Support for the “half” 16-bit floating-point pixel format.
- Multiple lossless image compression algorithms. Some of the included codecs can achieve 2:1 lossless compression ratios on images with film grain.
- Extensibility. New compression codecs and image types can easily be added by extending the C++ classes included in the OpenEXR software distribution. New image attributes (strings, vectors, integers, etc.) can be added to OpenEXR image headers without affecting backward compatibility with existing OpenEXR applications.
Website: www.openexr.com
Support: Documentation
Developer: Florian Kainz, Rod Bogart, Drew Hess, Paul Schneider, Bill Anderson, Wojciech Jarosz, Andrew Kunz, and many contributors
License: Modified BSD License
Return to HDR Imaging Home Page
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