Add Film Grain — Pure Film Grain Overlay with Adjustable Strength

Pure film grain overlay with adjustable strength. Useful after heavy edits. Files never leave your device.

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Drop your image here

Pure film grain overlay with adjustable strength. PNG, JPG, or WebP — files never leave your device.

Intended use

Intended for creative and aesthetic purposes: applying visual effects to images you own.
The grain is procedural random noise, not a scan of real film. It looks uniform rather than structured.
Output is re-encoded as PNG. The original format and compression settings are not preserved.

Film grain is texture. It is the silver-halide crystals that give analog photographs their organic, tactile quality. Digital images — especially heavily processed or AI-generated ones — can look sterile, flat, and unnaturally smooth. Adding grain is one of the simplest ways to restore a sense of materiality.

This tool applies a procedural noise overlay to your image, blending random luminance perturbations with the original pixel values. Unlike a uniform noise filter, the grain respects the image’s existing tones — darker areas get darker grain, lighter areas get lighter grain, and the overall exposure is preserved.

Three grain types are available: Fine (subtle, high-frequency noise for a velvety texture), Medium (the default — a balanced grain that reads as standard 35mm film), and Coarse (larger, more visible grain for a pushed-film or high-ISO look). The Amount slider controls intensity from 0 (no grain) to 50 (heavy, texture-dominating grain).

This is a focused tool. It does one thing — add grain — and nothing else. Use it after the Film Photo Filter to complete the analog look. Use it after the Image Humanizer to restore texture lost during fingerprint removal. Use it after any heavy edit to give the output a cohesive, natural feel. All processing runs in your browser; your images never leave your device.

How to use

Drop an image
Drag any PNG, JPG, or WebP into the drop zone. The file is read in your browser and never leaves your device.
Choose grain type and strength
Select Fine, Medium, or Coarse grain. Fine adds subtle noise, Medium gives a standard film-grain look, and Coarse creates a heavier, more textured grain. Use the Amount slider (0–50) to control intensity.
Download the grained image
The processed image is available for download with a `-grain` suffix. The grain is applied as a random noise overlay blended with the original pixel values.

Frequently asked

What does film grain do to an image?

Film grain adds a layer of random luminance noise that simulates the silver-halide crystals in analog film. It can mask compression artifacts, add texture to flat surfaces, give a nostalgic feel to digital images, and reduce the 'plastic' look of heavily denoised AI outputs.

When should I add grain?

Common use cases: after aggressive compression or resizing (to mask artifacts), after AI upscaling (to restore texture), after heavy editing (to unify the look), or as a creative choice for a film-like aesthetic. Grain is also useful after running the Image Humanizer — the humanizer may soften edges, and grain can bring back perceived sharpness.

Will this remove AI watermarks?

Not intentionally. Film grain is primarily an aesthetic tool. The random noise may incidentally degrade some frequency-domain watermarks as a side effect, but if watermark removal is your goal, use the dedicated sanitizers instead.

Are my images uploaded?

No. All processing runs in your browser. The image is decoded to a canvas, random noise is blended with the pixel data, and the result is re-encoded. No network call is made.

Limitations

Synthetic grain onlyThe grain is procedural random noise, not a scan of real film grain. It produces a uniform noise field rather than the structured, density-dependent grain pattern of real film. For a more authentic film look, combine this with the Film Photo Filter.
PNG output onlyThe grain pipeline encodes output as PNG. If you need JPEG or WebP output, use the format converter tools after adding grain.

Platform notes

macOS: Preview.app and Photos do not have a film-grain effect. Third-party apps like Pixelmator Pro offer grain overlays.
Windows: Paint and Photos do not offer grain effects. Free tools like GIMP with the G'MIC plugin can add film grain.
Linux: CLI alternative: ImageMagick with `-noise Gaussian` or `+noise` operators. The grain function in this tool is exposed in `src/lib/ai-cleanup/image-effects.ts`.
Web: Runs entirely client-side. The image is decoded to a canvas, random noise is blended with pixel data, and a Blob URL is generated for download. No upload, no server roundtrip.