Abstract
If one has in mind that more than 45% of all deadly accidents occur at night time or dawn, although just 25% percent of the averaged traffic occurs at night, optimal lighting devices are very important to increase traffic safety. In this paper a new night time driving simulator is described, which allows to simulate night time scenery with the computer using virtual reality technologies. As the main point, the real light distribution is used to illuminate the scene and it is possible to perform an interactive virtual night drive even with low cost hardware. This technology is essential for the development of optimal lighting devices.