Visual perception of 3D printed translucent objects

In order to reproduce translucent objects by 3D printers employing fully transparent (or clear) material, modeling the human visual perception of translucency is crucial. In this preliminary study, a set of 256 texture-less samples was created by mixing white and clear materials using multi-jet 3D printing. The samples differ in both lateral light transport properties and transmittance. Two psychophysical experiments were conducted to reveal the relationship between transmittance and a perceptually uniform scale for translucency. The results show that Stevens’ power law describes well this relationship within the optically thin range of samples. Furthermore, the sensitivity to lateral light transport is small compared to transmittance for the texture-less sample set. Introduction Multi-jet or Polyjet 3D printers, such as the Stratasys Objet Connex series [1], are able to combine multiple UV curable materials on a droplet level into a single object. In contrast to 3D printers using powder blinder [2] and layer-laminated manufacturing [3] technologies, multi-jet 3D printers are capable of creating objects of spatially-varying color, translucency and haptical properties. In addition, multi-jetting allows for high resolution prints and can produce smooth surfaces, making it very suitable for appearance reproduction. Gamma Value 8 × 9 0 μ m