
Bright paint makes interior-space surfaces appear farther away
Author(s) -
Christoph von Castell,
Heiko Hecht,
Daniel Oberfeld
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
plos one
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.99
H-Index - 332
ISSN - 1932-6203
DOI - 10.1371/journal.pone.0201976
Subject(s) - luminance , ceiling (cloud) , hue , optics , stereoscopy , context (archaeology) , bounding overwatch , brightness , computer science , geometry , materials science , mathematics , geology , physics , artificial intelligence , paleontology , meteorology
Previous studies have reported that bright ceilings appear higher than dark ceilings, irrespective of the other colorimetric properties of the ceiling color (hue, saturation) and irrespective of the luminance of the remaining room surfaces (walls, floor). In the present study, we expand these findings to width and depth estimates. We presented stereoscopic full-scale room simulations on a head-mounted display and varied the luminance of the side walls, rear wall, and ceiling independently of each other. Participants judged the width and depth of the simulated rooms. Our results show that the perceived spatial layout of a given room is significantly influenced by the luminance of the direct bounding surfaces (e.g., the side walls when judging perceived width) but less affected by the luminance of the other surfaces. In the discussion, we provide an overall picture of effects of surface luminance on the perceived layout of interior spaces and discuss the conclusions in the context of existing interior-design guidelines.