Perceived three-dimensional shape toggles perceived glow

Most surfaces reflect light from external sources, but others emit light: they glow. Glowing surfaces are often a sign of an important feature of the environment, such as a heat source or a bioluminescent life form, but we know little about how the human visual system identifies them. Previous work has shown that luminance and luminance gradients are important in glow perception [1,2]. While a link between glow and shape has been suggested in the literature [3], there has been no systematic investigation of this relationship. Here we show that perceived three-dimensional shape plays a decisive role in glow perception; vivid percepts of glow can be toggled on and off, simply by changing cues to three-dimensional shape while holding other image features constant.