Thermal Video Effect
Make a video look like thermal camera footage: false-colour heat, glowing people, a grainy low-resolution sensor and auto-gain that drifts as the scene changes, with a live temperature readout. Watch it as it plays, then export an MP4. It's free with no watermark, and your video is never uploaded.
How to make a video look like a thermal image
- Drop a photo or video onto the editor, paste one from your clipboard, or click to choose a file.
- Pick a palette and a sensor size, then tune the softness, noise, body heat and edge detail. The preview updates as you go.
- For photos, click Download to save a JPEG or PNG. For videos, click Render video, watch the result, then download it as an MP4.
How it works
An ordinary photo doesn't record heat, so the effect makes an educated guess at what would run warm or cold, then puts that guess through everything a real thermal (microbolometer) camera does to its picture:
- Heat estimate
- Brighter and warmer-coloured things read hotter; blue sky, water and shade read colder. Skin tones get extra heat (set by Body heat), so people glow the way they do on the real thing.
- Sensor resolution
- Thermal sensors are tiny: 80 to 640 pixels across, where a phone camera has thousands. The heat is averaged down to the sensor's grid and smoothly scaled back up, which gives that soft, low-detail look.
- Lens softness and noise
- A gentle blur for the lens, then grain that changes every frame and the faint vertical and horizontal stripes left by uneven sensor pixels.
- Automatic gain
- Like a real camera, the range of temperatures in view is stretched across the whole palette. In video the range eases from frame to frame instead of jumping, so the colours drift as the scene changes.
- Palettes
- Ironbow (black through purple and orange to white), white hot, black hot, rainbow for small differences, lava and arctic.
- Edge detail
- Outlines from the ordinary picture laid over the heat, as some cameras do with a second, visible-light camera, so faces and text stay readable.
- Camera readout
- A crosshair with the spot temperature at the centre, a scale bar with the warmest and coolest temperatures in view, in °C or °F. The numbers are for looks: they're made up from the heat estimate, not measured.
Thermal video
Load an MP4, MOV or WebM video (up to 250 MB and 2 minutes) and scrub to any frame, or press play to watch the effect live. When it looks right, render the whole video, which exports as an H.264 MP4 at 480p, 720p or 1080p with the sound kept. Turn on Bitcrush audio to crunch the soundtrack too.
Frequently asked questions
Is this a real thermal image?
No. A real thermal camera measures infrared light, which an ordinary photo doesn't contain. This is a visual effect that guesses at heat from color and brightness, then imitates how a thermal camera's picture looks. The temperatures it shows are for looks only.
Are my photos and videos uploaded?
No. Everything happens in your browser using WebAssembly, so your files never leave your device.
Is it free?
Yes. It's free to use with no sign-up and no watermark on what you download.
Which file types can I use?
Any image your browser can open (JPEG, PNG, WebP, GIF, and HEIC in Safari), and videos in MP4, MOV or WebM. Photos larger than 4096 pixels on a side are scaled down to fit. Photos download as JPEG or PNG and videos as MP4.