Simulation Techniques for Studying Night Driver Effects on Driver Behavior

To properly simulate nighttime visibility conditions for driving simulation, one must first consider visibility issues in human vision. From a safety point of view, the driver must see road markings to maintain lane position and navigate complex intersections. The driver must also be able to detect objects including pedestrians that must be avoided. Furthermore, the simulator should present scenes that properly represent limiting levels of visibility as seen by the human eye but with careful consideration of the dynamic range of the selected display. In this proposed Phase I program, Systems Technology, Inc. will demonstrate the feasibility of several approaches important to creating effective night driving simulation scenes. These include methods for representing the high dynamic range of brightness of night driving luminances, for simulating opposing light source glare, for providing model texture maps that represent object reflectance and multiple light sources (building window lights, traffic signals, etc.) and for simply creating night driving scenarios. To properly represent glare associated with opposing traffic headlights, flare and bloom intensity effects that are proportional to the light source brightness and inversely proportional to the distance from the source and the line of sight will be used.