Architects require pictures involving marble floor, wood paneling, with sunlight streaming in. Automobile stylers require pictures involving chrome, glass, wax, metallic paint, reflections of the great outdoors. Product designers require pictures involving a wide range of shapes, materials, texture. There are other demands outside of traditional CAD markets. Broadcasters require animated sequences of recent and predicted weather patterns and accurate recreations of news events.
Scientists require realistic graphics simulations of experimental processes.
The Elements of Photorealism Achieving photorealism demands greater sophistication in both modeling and rendering. Most current modeling systems are concerned only with geometry, with the shape of the design. The crucial missing elements are visual attributes, the surface characteristics of the object. Providing usable systems for modeling the surface attributes and complex lighting conditions is a major problem for CAD vendors. The time is right for a 3-D scene description standard for photorealism.