Corrosion rendering: fusing simulation and photo-texturing

Abstract

We present a technique for realistic rendering of corroded objects. We employ a physio-chemically based stochastic model to determine the deterioration level of different points on an object, given its material characteristics and the vigor of the environment. Guided by values from the ISO standard, our model predicts shape degradation. This shape degradation is then applied to the object in the form of surface displacements and weathered appearance. The appearance degradation is hard to physically model accurately due to its dependence on a large number of unknown parameters as well as its high sensitivity to errors in modeling them. Hence, we instead sample from photographs of real objects to generate similar appearance for the rendered surface, but consistent with the simulated corrosion levels. We demonstrate our technique using several simulation results as well as different input photographs. We also evaluate the fidelity of the generated output to the simulation as well as to the sample texture patterns and validate our work with the help of data published in the corrosion literature. Our framework is generic and can be extended to a variety of corrosion scenarios. Ours is an important step towards predictive analysis of material loss and weathering phenomena for real objects.