Pursuing Reality with Image-Based Modeling, Rendering, and Lighting

This paper presents techniques and animations developed from 1991 to 2000 that use digital photographs of the real world to create 3D models, virtual camera moves, and realistic computer animations. In these projects, images are used to determine the structure, appearance, and lighting conditions of the scenes. Early work in recovering geometry (and generating novel views) from silhouettes and stereo correspondence are presented, which motivate Façade, an interactive photogrammetric modeling system that uses geometric primitives to model the scene. Subsequent work has been done to recover lighting and reflectance properties of real scenes, to illuminate synthetic objects with light captured from the real world, and to directly capture reflectance fields of real-world objects and people. The projects presented include The Chevette Project (1991), Immersion 94 (1994), Rouen Revisited (1996), The Campanile Movie (1997), Rendering with Natural Light (1998), Fiat Lux (1999), and the Light Stage (2000).