Selected Publications

• The Veiled Virgin illustrates visual segmentation of shape by cause.

  

  Authors:

  Phillips & Fleming

  Journal:

  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

  Summary:

  Inspired by a famous statue depicting the Virgin Mary wearing a transparent veil, we investigated how observers visually segment 3D shapes into multiple 'causal layers'.

  Citation:

  Phillips F* & RW Fleming* (2020). The Veiled Virgin illustrates visual segmentation of shape by cause. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 201917565; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1917565117

  
  

• Learning to See Stuff

  

  Authors:

  Fleming & Storrs

  Journal:

  Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences

  Summary:

  An introduction to unsupervised deep learning approaches to vision, which advocates for such 'statistical appearance models' as being more appropriate ways to think about material perception than classic 'inverse optics' frameworks.

  Citation:

  Fleming RW & KR Storrs (2019) Learning to See Stuff. Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences. 30: 100–108. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cobeha.2019.07.004

  
  

• Visual Features in the Perception of Liquids

  

  Authors:

  Van Assen, Barla, Fleming

  Journal:

  Current Biology

  Summary:

  Here, using state-of-the-art fluid simulations, we investigate the cues underlying the perception of liquid viscosity. We suggest that midlevel visual features describing a liquids shape and motion play a key role in viscosity perception

  Citation:

  Van Assen, JJ, Barla P & Fleming, RW (2018). Visual Features in the Perception of Liquids. Current Biology 28(3), 452–458. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2017.12.037

  
  

• Material Perception

  

  Authors:

  Fleming

  Journal:

  Annual Reviews of Vision Science

  Summary:

  This paper reviews recent work on material perception and scrutinizes some basic assumptions of mid-level vision to propose an alternative approach to how material properties might be estimated and represented.

  Citation:

  Fleming RW (2017). Material Perception. Annual Reviews of Vision Science 3(1). 365-388. doi: 10.1146/annurev-vision-102016-061429

  
  

• Visual perception of shape altered by inferred causal history

  

  Authors:

  Spröte, Schmidt, Fleming

  Journal:

  Scientific Reports

  Summary:

  This paper shows how object perception is affected by the perceived causal origin of object features. Specfically, when concavities appear as bitten out, participants judge object symmetry and structure (front-back) as if bitten regions were suppressed.

  Citation:

  Spröte, P., Schmidt, F and R.W. Fleming (2016). Visual perception of shape altered by inferred causal history. Scientific Reports, 6:36245. DOI: 10.1038/srep36245.

  
  

• Flow-Guided Warping for Image-Based Shape Manipulation

  

  Authors:

  Vergne, Barla, Bonneau, Fleming

  Journal:

  ACM Transactions on Graphics

  Summary:

  We present an interactive method that manipulates perceived object shape using a spatial warping technique to exaggerate orientation patterns in the image that are strongly correlated to surface curvature. Our algorithm produces convincing shape manipulation results on synthetic imagesand photographs, for various materials and lighting environments.

  Citation:

  Vergne, R., Barla P., Bonneau, G.-P. and R. W. Fleming (2016). Flow-Guided Warping for Image-Based Shape Manipulation. ACM Transactions on Graphics (Proceedings of SIGGRAPH 2016), 35(4): 93. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2897824.2925937.

  
  

• 'Proto-rivalry': how the binocular brain identifies gloss

  

  Authors:

  Muryy, Fleming, Welchman

  Journal:

  Proceedings of the Royal Society of London

  Summary:

  Here, we show that the brain exploits some surprisingly simple binocular fusion signals to identify glossy surfaces. We show that the widely held concept of 'binocular luster' is wrong. Instead it is the partial fusion that occurs when binocular matches stray from epipolar geometry that drives binocular gloss perception.

  Citation:

  Muryy, A.A., R.W. Fleming and A.E. Welchman (2016). 'Proto-rivalry': how the binocular brain identifies gloss. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London (B), 283: 20160383. doi: 10.1098/rspb.2016.0383

  
  

• Visual Perception of Materials and their Properties

  

  Authors:

  Fleming

  Journal:

  Vision Research

  Summary:

  Here we review the perception of materials and propose that the visual system uses generative statisical models of material appearance to represent and distinguish between different materials.

  Citation:

  Fleming, R.W. (2014). Visual Perception of Materials and their Properties. Vision Research, 94, 62-75

  
  

• Specular reflections and the estimation of shape from binocular disparity

  

  Authors:

  Muryy, Welchman, Blake, Fleming

  Journal:

  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

  Summary:

  We studied binocular 3D shape perception for ideal mirrored surfaces, finding that far from 'knowing the physics' of specular reflection, they make substantial errors. The responses are consistent with a process that identifies reliable local disparity signals and interpolates between them.

  Citation:

  Muryy, A., Welchman, A.E., Blake, A. and R.W. Fleming (2013). Specular reflections and the estimation of shape from binocular disparity. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 110(6): 2413-2418.

  
  

• Estimation of 3D shape from image orientations

  

  Authors:

  Fleming, Holtmann-Rice, Bülthoff

  Journal:

  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

  Summary:

  Here we show that the perception of 3D shape from surface texture patterns is based primarily on specific 2D orientation signals. Perceptually adapting orientation detectors causes unoriented random noise to look like specific 3D shapes, leading to striking illusions.

  Citation:

  Fleming, R. W., Holtmann-Rice, D. and H. H. Bülthoff (2011). Estimation of 3D shape from image orientations. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 108(51) 20438-20443.

  
  

• Visual Motion and the Perception of Surface Material

  

  Authors:

  Doerschner, Fleming, Yilmaz, Schrater, Hartung, Kersten

  Journal:

  Current Biology

  Summary:

  In this paper we show the central role that optical flow plays in the perception of surface glossiness. We show that sticking reflections onto a surface makes it look matte, and identify specific optic flow characteristics that can predict surface material illusions.

  Citation:

  Doerschner, K. Fleming, R.W., Yilmaz, O., Schrater, P.R., Hartung, B. and Kersten, D. (2011). Visual Motion and the Perception of Surface Material. Current Biology, 21(23): 1-7.