Alpha Compositing Details

    Over compositing operation:

    Issues with alpha:
Premultiplied (integral) alphas:
  • pixel contains (a, ar, ag, ab)
  • what Image Composer
  • alpha value constrains color magnitude
  • alpha modulates image shape
non-Premultiplied (independent) alphas:
  • pixel contains (a, r, g, b)
  • what Photoshop does (via layers)
  • color values independent of alpha
  • what does 100% tranparency mean?


(An excellent reference on the subject)
Lecture 4 Slide 19 6.837 Fall '98