Patent · US Expired

Method and system for detecting a flaw in a sample image

US6295374A · kind A · utility

57Cited by
14References
14Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateApr 6, 1998
Grant dateSep 25, 2001
Priority date
Expiry dateApr 6, 2018

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC G)Physics
  • CPC primaryG06T2207/30144
  • WIPO fieldComputer technology
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

A method and system are described for use at a machine vision station to correctly identify flaws within a sample image by means of flexible template image comparison where the template image and a sample image suffer from a relative geometrical distortion. The method and system use the following iterative approach: 1) generate the template image; 2) register the sample image to the template image; 3) undertake an absolute image subtraction process; 4) identify all regions of image difference; 5) create sub-images of both the template and the sample images in the region of detected error; 6) repeat the registration step 2) using the sub-images; 7) undertake the absolute subtraction process on each of the sub-images; and 8) either identify the resulting differences as flaws or go to step 5) using even smaller sub-images. The invention has particular utility in the screen printing industry as well as other industries.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.