Identification of surface colors across environmental illuminations
- 1University of Oxford
Abstract
When objects are embedded in a complex lighting environment, the illumination they receive depends on their geometric relationship to the environment. We measured performance in an odd-one-out color constancy task, with objects rendered in complex lighting environments. Observers identified the odd object among four objects, with two rendered under each of two lighting environments, sampled from a wide range of object orientations and camera positions. Constancy was high. The presence of a surrounding context increased accuracy. Gloss provided no measurable benefit. We also tested a condition in which the global color impression provided misleading information about the lighting environment, but this impaired performance only slightly. These findings suggest that human color constancy remains robust even under complex lighting environments, contrary to predictions of many simple models of illuminant discounting.
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BibTeX
@misc{morimoto2026identification,
title = {{Identification of surface colors across environmental illuminations}},
author = {T. Morimoto and H. E. Smithson},
howpublished = {bioRxiv},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.64898/2026.10.03.756408},
url = {https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.10.03.756408v1},
note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Identification of surface colors across environmental illuminations
AU - T. Morimoto
AU - H. E. Smithson
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/03
PB - bioRxiv
DO - 10.64898/2026.10.03.756408
UR - https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.10.03.756408v1
AB - When objects are embedded in a complex lighting environment, the illumination they receive depends on their geometric relationship to the environment. We measured performance in an odd-one-out color constancy task, with objects rendered in complex lighting environments. Observers identified the odd object among four objects, with two rendered under each of two lighting environments, sampled from a wide range of object orientations and camera positions. Constancy was high. The presence of a surrounding context increased accuracy. Gloss provided no measurable benefit. We also tested a condition in which the global color impression provided misleading information about the lighting environment, but this impaired performance only slightly. These findings suggest that human color constancy remains robust even under complex lighting environments, contrary to predictions of many simple models of illuminant discounting.
ER -