soapblind

Description

Applies a hazy, washed-over film that resembles the visual blur of “soap-blinded eyes” — a foggy, filmy distortion that softens detail and reduces clarity.
The result is a dreamy, smeared, low-contrast haze that feels like staring through suds, steam, or a semi-opaque membrane.

Purpose

soapblind is designed for creators who want:

soft-focus blur with a filmy, washed texture,
low-clarity visuals that feel dreamy, obscured, or emotional,
stylized haze for music videos, collage, or narrative sequences,
an immediate, no-argument atmospheric filter,
a diffused look that smooths harsh details and glazes the frame.

How It Works

Surface Diffusion
A hazy overlay softens micro-contrast and reduces sharpness.
Fog-Like Bloom
Highlights bloom outward, mimicking fogged or soap-smeared vision.
Clarity Reduction
Noise, edges, and fine detail are blurred to create a dreamlike veil.
Encoding
The final treated video is encoded with global Videobeaux settings (codec, CRF, pixel format).

Program Template

videobeaux -P soapblind \
  -i input.mp4 \
  -o output.mp4

Arguments

(No additional program-specific arguments; uses global videobeaux options only.)

Real World Example

videobeaux -P soapblind \
  -i myvideo.mp4 \
  -o soapblind_styled.mp4

Program Output

Technical Notes

Smooth surfaces and skin tones take especially well to the soapblind look.
High-contrast footage will soften dramatically as edges blur.
Compression can make fogginess appear more pronounced at higher CRF levels.
Works as a gentler alternative to heavy blur filters.

Recommended Usage

Emotional, melancholic, or introspective scenes.
Dream sequences or memory dissolves.
Music videos needing soft glaze or atmospheric haze.
Preprocessing for collage pieces to unify mismatched clips.
Creating softness before applying glitch or distortion filters.

Quality Tips

Lower CRF yields velvety, smooth haze.
Higher CRF introduces gritty texture into the fog.
Combine with slight_smear for a double-soft aesthetic.
Pair with repainting for painterly, softened brushlike visuals.
Use before LUTs if you want the softness baked into the grade; use after if you want LUTs to remain crisp.

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