Why use the harmonic mean in the split sphere model?

radiance-general
1

Hello.

I am doing a basic study of Radiance.
The paper says to find the radius of the sphere in split sphere model by harmonic mean, why is that?
Why can’t I use arithmetic mean?

regard

2

In general, when you apply a mean value in an equation where it is raised to some power, that same power should be used in the averaging process. In this case, the power is -1. In other cases (such as RMS values), the power is 2. It keeps the calculation from being unduly influenced by a few outlier values.

3

Hi Greg.

It was my understanding that the reason for doing harmonic averaging instead of RMS is to prevent outliers from heavily influencing the results.

Thanks for letting me know!