Validation of Vision Systems

One of the most importants steps in quality inspection is to verify whether visable spots do indeed have a physical correspondence or if they are irrelevant artifacts. On the other hand, we need to ensure that all physical defects, such as dents or scratches, are indeed detected.

Example

This movie shows an example of such a validation. Inspired by the famous short film Powers of Ten of Charles and Ray Eames released in 1977, we visualise the defects on a 10-by-10 mm metal plate on different scales. On the largest scale we used standard image acquisition techniques. We zoom in and crossfade to images aquired by an electron microscope (at about 0:10-0:12). At the highest resolution an area of about 10-by-8 µm is shown.

This method allows for an extremely accurate calibration of the image acquisition system, e.g. for high-resolution scanners or medical vision systems.