Reminded me of this, by JP Lewis in 2001 Lifting Detail from Darkness http://www.scribblethink.org/Work/Talks/dalmatian.pdf http://www.scribblethink.org/Work/

Reminded me of this, by JP Lewis in 2001 Lifting Detail from Darkness http://www.scribblethink.org/Work/Talks/dalmatian.pdf http://www.scribblethink.org/Work/Talks/dalmatian.pdf This application sketch describes a high quality method for separating detail from overall image region intensity. This intensity-detail decomposition can be used to automate some specialized image alteration tasks. Our work was motivated by the movie 102 Dalmatians, which featured a dalmatian puppy without spots. Animal handlers determined that the obvious idea of applying makeup to the dog was not possible – evidently there was no suitable makeup that was both safe to the dogs and that would stay in place during normal dog activity (including licking). This left Disney TSL with the task of painting out all the spots on the dog every few frames (the paintings were carried for a few frames with a simple scheme). The spot removal task was larger than anyone guessed, and ultimately required a large number of artists (up to 40) working for eight months. The problem also proved to be more difficult than expected from an algorithmic point of view. As the spots often had visible fur texture, initially it was believed that there must be some simple compositing technique that could lighten these spots.