The RADIANCE Lighting Simulation and Rendering System

Gregory J. Ward / [email protected]

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ABSTRACT

1. Introduction

2. System Design Goals

The original goals for the Radiance system were modest, or so we thought. The idea was to produce an accurate tool for lighting simulation and visualization based on ray-tracing. Although the initial results were promising, we soon learned that there was much more to getting the simulation right than plugging proper values and units into a standard ray-tracing algorithm. We needed to overcome some basic shortcomings. The main shortcoming of conventional ray-tracing is that diffuse interreflection between surfaces is approximated by a uniform "ambient" term. For many scenes, this is a poor approximation, even if the ambient term is assigned correctly. Other difficulties arise in treating light distribution from large sources such as windows, skylights, and large fixtures. Finally, reflections of lights from mirrors and other secondary sources are problematic. These problems, which we will cover in some detail later, arose from the consideration of our system design goals, given below.

The principal design goals of Radiance were to:

1. Ensure accurate calculation of luminance
2. Model both electric light and daylight
3. Support a variety of reflectance models
4. Support complicated geometry
5. Take unmodified input from CAD systems

These goals reflect many years of experience in architectural lighting simulation; some of them are physically-motivated, others are user-motivated. All of them must be met before a lighting simulation tool can be of significant value to a designer.

2.1 Ensure Accurate Calculation of Luminance

2.2 Model Both Electric Light and Daylight

2.3 Support a Variety of Reflectance Models

2.4 Support Complicated Geometry

2.5 Take Unmodified Input from CAD Systems

3. Approach

3.1 Hybrid Deterministic/Stochastic Ray Tracing

3.2 Cached Indirect Irradiances for Diffuse Interreflection

3.3 Adaptive Sampling of Light Sources

3.4 Automatic Preprocessing of "Virtual" Light Sources

3.5 User-directed Preprocessing of "Secondary" Sources

3.6 Hierarchical Octrees for Spatial Subdivision

3.7 Patterns and Textures

3.8 Parallel Processing

3.9 Animation

3.10 Implementation Issues

4. Applications and Results

4.1 Electric Lighting

4.2 Daylighting

5. Conclusion

6. Acknowledgements

7. Software Availability

8. Bibliography

9. Appendix