Film, simulated
from the crystal up.
We are a small team of engineers based in South Africa. We build Emulsion because we love how film looks, and we wanted that look to come from what film actually is, not from a guess at what it looks like.
A simulator, not a filter.
Most film looks are built by eye: a colour table, some grain on top, a glow around the highlights. Emulsion starts somewhere else. Every stock is built from the data its manufacturer published: its characteristic curves, the spectral sensitivity of each layer, the spectra of its dyes, its granularity and its sharpness.
From that data, Emulsion simulates what happens to the light. It passes through the lens, exposes the film's silver halide crystals one by one, and is developed by chemistry that couples the layers to each other. Then it scatters back as halation and is printed onto a second film. The look is what comes out of the physics. Nothing is painted on afterwards.
We check the results against real film: measured scans, manufacturers' charts and the stocks themselves.
Our goals
Physics, not looks
Every effect in Emulsion is a physical process with a measured cause. If film doesn't do it, Emulsion doesn't either. When the data and the simulation disagree, we fix the simulation.
Every stock, honestly sourced
Each stock carries its provenance: which datasheets and measurements it was built from. You should be able to see why a stock looks the way it does.
Film for everyone who shoots digital
One node in DaVinci Resolve, or one app for stills. Drop it on your footage, pick a stock, and grade film the way a lab would have printed it.
Film that never existed
Because the stocks are physics, you can change them. With Stock Studio you can design a film stock from its crystals and dyes up, and share it with the community.
Who builds Emulsion
Based in South Africa. Questions, ideas or a stock you'd love to see simulated? Write to us at admin@emulsion64.com, or tell us on the beta feedback page if you're testing.