Subsurface Texture Mapping

This article presents a rendering technique for multilayered materials. Unlike existing methods, our technique does not assume that the thickness of these layers is constant. We use relief texture mapping to model a material´s interior. Instead of representing the surface details, we use this method to represent the object´s inner structure. We describe the material´s layers using a simple 2D texture, in which each channel encodes a thickness. Our method supports nonplanar surfaces and falls between subsurface rendering methods based on surfaces and 3D texture-based algorithms. Furthermore, our solution provides a compact way to design translucent objects using a small amount of data.