View-independent Modeling of Lighting Systems by Local Estimations of the Monte Carlo Method

Computer-aided designing of lighting systems has been remaining of relevance for more than ten years. The most popular CAD packages for calculating lighting systems, such as DIAlux and Relux, are based on solving the radiosity equation. By using this equation, the illuminance distributions can be modeled, based on which the standardized quantitative lighting characteristics can be calculated. However, the human eye perceives brightness, not illuminance. The qualitative parameters of lighting are closely linked with the spatial-angular distribution of brightness, for calculation of which it is necessary to solve the global illumination equation. An analysis of the engineering matters concerned with designing of lighting systems points to the obvious need for a so-called view-independent calculation of lighting scenes, which means the possibility to visually represent a scene from different positions of sighting (a camera). The approach based on local estimations of the Monte Carlo method as one of efficient techniques for solving the global illumination equation is considered, and an algorithm for view-independent modeling based on the local estimations method is presented. Various algorithms for solving the problem of searching the intersection for the casted beams from a light source with the studied illumination scene are investigated.