CAREER: Modeling the Properties and Appearance of Materials

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Today it is feasible to attempt very realistic rendering of complex natural scenes: for example, in the film effects industry a particular focus is rendering realistic humans. The difficulty of doing this illuminates the shortcomings in current knowledge about skin, hair, and cloth and how their physical properties produce the distinctive visual appearance of these materials. Across the board, the increasing quality of computer-generated images is limited by a fundamental unsolved problem: the efficient and accurate modeling of the properties of materials. This research addresses this problem by looking at materials in several ways: how they interact with light, how they change their shape and appearance as they move, and how human observers perceive them.In a departure from much previous work on materials in graphics, this research program expands the definition of material properties from optical properties alone to include mechanical properties and their effects. Additionally, material appearance is considered in the context of human visual perception. These goals lead to three related paths of research:1. Optics of materials. Light reflection is central to rendering materials and forms the core of this research: developing the fundamentals using a scientific approach progressing from measurements of real materials through analysis to models that are practical for rendering.2. Mechanics of materials. Recognizing that optics and static geometry alone suffice only to represent rigid materials, this project broadens the definition of material properties to include the mechanical properties that create the distinctive shape and motion that are so important to the appearance of deformable materials.3. Perception of materials. Rendering is about making images that will be viewed by human observers, and to achieve efficiency and quality it is critical to have a better understanding of how the human visual system interprets, classifies, and infers properties of materials