ClearForm: Shared-Surface Gaussian Splatting for Transparent and Opaque Scenes

Hajeong Lee, Jong-Il Park

Transparent-interface reconstruction must recover glass surfaces even when most observed color comes from the scene behind them. We present ClearForm, a shared-planar-Gaussian method for jointly reconstructing transparent interfaces and the appearance seen through them. We identify and analyze the Geometry-Appearance Compositing Dilemma (GACD): when the same transparency-dependent alpha controls both color and geometry, revealing the background can weaken a transparent surface's contribution to geometric reconstruction. We derive its effect on plane-based depth estimation, identify a mechanism that can weaken geometric learning, and quantify the loss of interface support through controlled comparisons. To address this conflict, we develop geometry-preserving dual-opacity surface reconstruction. Shared planar Gaussians retain interface contributions in geometry compositing while modeling transmission and sparse reflection in RGB, supported by transparency-aware geometric constraints. To manage the different primitive-visibility requirements of these compositors, we introduce Dual-Evidence Lifecycle (DEL), which retains Gaussians supported by multi-view geometry or RGB…