Abstract: The human visual system is robust with respect to changes in illumination conditions that are close to daylight. This capability to compensate for variations in colored light is known as chromatic adaptation (CA). A direct application of CA models is found in automatic white balance (AWB) algorithms, which are present in every smartphone. In this talk, I will introduce a recently developed quantum information-based mathematical model for color perception. In this framework, CA is described using a so-called sandwich formula of split quaternions. I will also present results from applying this model to AWB in digital images.
Collecting data to verify the reliability of CA models is challenging, as it is non-trivial to achieve the condition of matching colors perceived under two different viewing conditions. Virtual reality provides a powerful tool to address this issue, and I will describe a novel experimental technique that we recently tested. Finally, I will conclude by discussing some ongoing projects that explore the use of non-Euclidean techniques for space perception, such as changes in the point of view and non-linear perspective, and their interaction with VR.
Biography: Nicoletta Prencipe received her MSc in Mathematics from the Dipartimento di Matematica Tullio Levi-Civita at the Università degli Studi di Padova, Italy, in 2019. She received her PhD from the Institut de Mathématiques de Bordeaux, University of Bordeaux, in collaboration with the Nice Research Center of Huawei Technologies, in 2022. Since 2023, she has been a postdoctoral researcher at the Center for Ubiquitous Computing at the University of Oulu in northern Finland, working in the Perception Engineering group led by Steven LaValle and Timo Ojala. Her primary research interest is in the mathematical modeling of human visual perception and its interaction with image processing and virtual reality applications.