In this paper a low-cost, practical pixel-based flame spectrum and temperature estimation system based on flame color images is proposed. A spectral resolution of similar to 0.4 nm is achieved with an optical system formed by a color camera, a linear model, a flame's spectral training data, and a spectral reconstruction procedure. As a proof of concept, the estimated spectra are compared to local measurements performed with a commercial spectrometer. In order to estimate the absolute flame-temperature maps, two radiometric images at different wavelengths are reconstructed and the two-color pyrometry method is applied. Experiments show errors of about 2.0% over the estimated temperature, making this system a practical tool for flame sensing in combustion-process monitoring. (C) 2014 Optical Society of America