Material perception

Perception of what objects are made of and their properties, including gloss, translucency, roughness and mechanical behavior. It depends on illumination, geometry, viewpoint and task as well as the material itself.

An appearance or optical behavior in which light is transmitted and scattered through a material rather than forming a clear transmitted image. Shape, thickness and illumination affect the available cues.

Variation of surface geometry over a specified range of spatial scales. Its optical effects depend on scale relative to wavelength and imaging resolution, material and illumination; perceived roughness is not a direct measurement of one universal roughness parameter.

A surface appearance associated with directional optical reflection and its image structure. Highlights, their relation to diffuse shading and their behavior across views can contribute; bright pixels alone are not a unique physical gloss measure.

Compatibility of highlight position and orientation with diffuse shading and inferred surface geometry. Controlled manipulations distinguish the relational cue from merely having bright pixels near a luminance maximum.