The role of brightness and orientation congruence in the perception of surface gloss

The perception of surface gloss depends on specular highlights but little is understood about how the visual system distinguishes specular highlights from other luminance maxima generated by variations in pigmentation or illumination. It has been argued that diffuse shading gradients provide information for identifying specular highlights. Specular highlights typically share the orientation of the diffuse shading locally. Specular highlights are typically proximal to the brightest region of the diffuse shading locally. We compared the contributions of these two relationships to perceived gloss. Highlight orientation relative to the diffuse shading was varied by rotating highlights. Highlight distance from the brightest region of the diffuse shading was varied by translating highlights in displays that preserved the orientations of highlights relative to their surrounds. Both manipulations reduced perceived gloss. Rotations reduced perceived gloss more than translations, even though translations displaced highlights into darker regions than rotations. The same reductions in perceived gloss occurred when highlights were matched in perceived contrast across conditions (Experiment 2b). The results provide evidence that the perception of gloss depends on highlight distance from the luminance maxima of the surrounding intensity gradient (brightness congruence) in addition to the shared orientation of highlights with their surrounds (orientation congruence).