# A Computational Model of a Single-Photon Avalanche Diode Sensor for Transient Imaging

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/1703.02635 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/1703.02635/

## Key facts

- Cited by 13 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- First posted on arXiv 23 Feb 2017.

## Built on by (most cited first, 13 of 13)

- [Physics to the Rescue: Deep Non-line-of-sight Reconstruction for High-speed Imaging](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2205.01679/) (2022)
- [Towards 3D Vision with Low-Cost Single-Photon Cameras](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.17801/) (2024)
- [Recent Advances on Non-Line-of-Sight Imaging: Conventional Physical Models, Deep Learning, and New Scenes](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2104.13807/) (2021)
- [Adaptive Gating for Single-Photon 3D Imaging](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2111.15047/) (2021)
- [Virtual Light Transport Matrices for Non-Line-Of-Sight Imaging](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2103.12622/) (2021)
- [Self-Calibrating, Fully Differentiable NLOS Inverse Rendering](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2309.12047/) (2023)
- [Learning to Enhance Aperture Phasor Field for Non-Line-of-Sight Imaging](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2407.18574/) (2024)
- [Occlusion Fields: An Implicit Representation for Non-Line-of-Sight Surface Reconstruction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2203.08657/) (2022)
- [Generalizable Non-Line-of-Sight Imaging with Learnable Physical Priors](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2409.14011/) (2024)
- [Shoot-Bounce-3D: Single-Shot Occlusion-Aware 3D from Lidar by Decomposing Two-Bounce Light](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.06080/) (2025)
- [Onsite Non-Line-of-Sight Imaging via Online Calibrations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2112.14555/) (2021)
- [Practical Noise Modeling for SPAD Intensity Imaging](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2608.00489/) (2026)
- [Cascaded Non-Line-of-Sight Imaging](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2609.16017/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Single-Photon Avalanche Diodes (SPAD) are affordable photodetectors, capable to collect extremely fast low-energy events, due to their single-photon sensibility. This makes them very suitable for time-of-flight-based range imaging systems, allowing to reduce costs and power requirements, without sacrifizing much temporal resolution. In this work we describe a computational model to simulate the behaviour of SPAD sensors, aiming to provide a realistic camera model for time-resolved light transport simulation, with applications on prototyping new reconstructions techniques based on SPAD time-of-flight data. Our model accounts for the major effects of the sensor on the incoming signal. We compare our model against real-world measurements, and apply it to a variety of scenarios, including complex multiply-scattered light transport.