Projection Mapping under Environmental Lighting by Replacing Room Lights with Heterogeneous Projectors

Area of Science:

• Computer Vision
• Augmented Reality
• Human-Computer Interaction

Background:

• Projection mapping (PM) enhances real-world surfaces with projected images for simultaneous multi-user augmentation, aiding communication.
• Traditional PM requires dark environments for optimal projection quality, limiting practical applications.
• Existing PM systems struggle with ambient light, leading to reduced contrast and undesirable visual artifacts.

Purpose of the Study:

• To overcome the dark environment limitation in projection mapping.
• To develop a projector-based lighting system that replicates environmental lighting for PM.
• To enhance the realism and collaborative potential of projection mapping in ambient light conditions.

Main Methods:

• Developed a distributed projector optimization framework to replicate environmental lighting.
• Integrated a large-aperture projector with standard projectors to manage luminance and shadows.
• Replaced conventional room lighting with heterogeneous projectors that selectively illuminate the scene.

Main Results:

• The projector-based lighting system significantly enhanced contrast and realism of PM results under ambient lighting.
• Achieved a substantial shift from the undesirable aperture-color mode to the preferred surface-color mode.
• User studies validated the effectiveness of the system in improving PM quality and user experience.

Conclusions:

• The proposed system enables high-quality projection mapping in environments with existing lighting.
• This approach enhances visual fidelity and facilitates collaborative tasks by improving perceived color and reducing artifacts.
• The projector-based lighting system represents a significant advancement for practical, real-world augmented reality applications.