Thesis opportunities- Inverse Rendering for industry inspections

Inverse rendering is the process of estimating the 3D properties of a scene, like its geometry, materials, and lighting, from a 2D image. It is the opposite of forward rendering, which creates a 2D image from a 3D scene. The goal is to "reverse-engineer" a photograph to estimate rendering properties such as color, roughness and normals. 

It is reasonable to think that some types of defects are easier to differentiate in this representation.

The thesis would investigate the usability of such a method, its performance and limitation, some questions which could be interesting:

• Can small surface defects such as scratches be detected using the method
• Does the method have benefits over regular image processing in the detection of appearance-based defects
• Which of the methods available, AI single shot vs more traditional multi-shot estimators, are reasonable to run when the task is inspection

(Attr: Retro Toy by Shedmon)

Prerequisites

This thesis will involve programming, image processing, mathematics, and visualization and will give the opportunity of working with real hardware to solve industry close and relevant problems.

Contact

For more information about the position, contact:

Jens Edhammer, Application Developer, jens.edhammer@sick.se

or

Sarah Lantz, HR Business Partner, +46 739 10 99 37.

We warmly welcome your application — please submit it no later than October 26th.

SICK is a world-leading supplier of sensors and sensor solutions for industrial applications. We’re part of SICK AG — a global leader in sensor technology with 10,000 employees across 50 countries and headquarters in Freiburg, Germany. Together, we build technology that makes industries more efficient, intelligent, and safe.

As a Machine Vision Innovation Center, SICK Linköping develops high-performance cameras and advanced AI-powered software that drives the future of both manufacturing and logistics automation. Whether it’s helping robots pick the right item or enabling high-precision quality control with 2D and 3D vision, our solutions bring clarity, speed, and smart decision-making to complex industrial environments — all driven by a dedicated team of 100 colleagues.

We are very proud of being a healthy and attractive workplace. We have consistently been recognized as one of the best workplaces in Sweden according to the Great Place to Work survey. We actively work to reduce our climate footprint and engage in various initiatives to contribute to society and enhance diversity at our workplace.