A Real-Time Glare Rendering Technique Taking into Account Surface Reflection Attributes

Abstract

This paper proposes a novel glare generating method to render reflected light due to a strong light source on the surface of high-shininess objects. Phong's reflection model, which OpenGL adopts, is physically inexact when the brightness of the center of highlight exceeds maximum intensity. Higher reflection exponent (shininess) value, which should result in sharper highlight, only causes smaller highlight with the brightness unchanged. This makes the highlight look even darker. To solve this issue, we present a new glare generation model with a light energy preserving reflection model. By calculating more physically-correct high intensity reflection than Phong's model, the glare model produces realistic images which more plausibly represent the shininess of each object. An implementation of the glare model is done with OpenGL, which enables real-time rendering and flexible control of the glare shape.