A novel method for generating structured illumination of three-dimensional shape measurement using phase modulation

Projector nonlinearity is a common problem for digital structured light-based three-dimensional (3-D) shape measurement techniques. A temporal-spatial binary encoding method is presented for the purpose of eluding it. We build a 3-D shape measurement scheme by combining our proposed method with phase measurement profiling. A standard sinusoidal fringe pattern is divided into more than two binary fringe patterns using specially designed temporal and spatial binary encoding rule based on intensity hierarchic quantification, and then are in-focus projected onto the measured object at a time sequence to reconstruct a frame phase-shifting fringe image. On account of the projected binary fringe pattern strictly consisting of zeros and ones, the influence of the projector nonlinearity on the measurement result can be effectively ruled out and simultaneously enables high-quality sinusoidality. In-depth investigations by theoretical analysis and experiments are conducted to demonstrate the performance of this method.

Projector defocusing technique can eliminate projector nonlinearity in real-time three-dimensional shape measurement. However, the high-frequency harmonics brought by defocusing technique weakens the sinusoidal feature of the defocused fringe patterns, which will bring obvious measurement errors. The dithering algorithm is proposed to generate binary fringe, the projector is defocused properly to achieve approximate sinusoidal fringes. This method improves the sinusoidal property of the defocused fringe patterns. Absolute phase is retrieved by applying this method and phase-shifting algorithm. Simulations and experiments are carried out to verify the proposed method, and results show that phase quality has been improved greatly. Compared with existing methods, the proposed method achieves higher precision and can generate fringe patterns more sinusoidal, which is more proper for projector defocusing technique.

In the measurement of three-dimensional structure beyond the diffraction limit of the objective lens of the optical system using the speckle interferometry, it was reported that the shape of a measured object can be measured by detecting the change of phase distribution generated by a lateral shift instead of analyzing the focal image of the measured object. In this paper, it is investigated that the three-dimensional shape measurement can be realized by detecting the phase change of only the zeroth-order diffraction light by the lateral shift of the object using experimental results. As a result, it is confirmed that the shape information of the object is included in the zeroth-order diffraction light and that the three-dimensional shape can be measured by using only zeroth-order light without any higher order diffraction lights.

In recent years, fringe projection profilometry (FPP), as a kind of three-dimensional shape measurement technology, has achieved the great breakthrough, due to the rapid development of the high-speed camera and high-speed projection equipment. The number-theoretical approach, as a classical method for the temporal phase unwrapping algorithm, is suitable for the binary defocusing FPP since it can avoid the acquiring of low frequency fringes. However, in order to ensure the stability of phase unwrapping, the period of fringe is generally around 20, which leads to the limited accuracy of 3D measurement. In this paper, we propose a bi-frequency number-theoretical phase unwrapping method with depth constraint. Using the principle of depth constraint, we will eliminate the period ambiguities of each pixel within a pixel-variant local period range so that the method only requires the coprime of two fringe frequencies within the local period range instead of the conventional global range. In this way, the requirement of stability of the traditional number-theoretical phase unwrapping can be adjusted from global range to local range. The stability is higher in the local period range due to containing less period ambiguities. As a result, we can realize phase unwrapping of higher frequency fringes with the same stability. Several experiments on various scenes are performed, verifying that our method can achieve high-speed and high-precision 3D measurement.

Three-dimensional (3D) shape measurement based on fringe pattern projection techniques has been commonly used in various fields. One of the remaining challenges in fringe pattern projection is that camera sensor saturation may occur if there is a large range of reflectivity variation across the surface that causes measurement errors. To overcome this problem, a novel fringe pattern projection method is proposed to avoid image saturation and maintain high-intensity modulation for measuring shiny surfaces by adaptively adjusting the pixel-to-pixel projection intensity according to the surface reflectivity. First, three sets of orthogonal color fringe patterns and a sequence of uniform gray-level patterns with different gray levels are projected onto a measured surface by a projector. The patterns are deformed with respect to the object surface and captured by a camera from a different viewpoint. Subsequently, the optimal projection intensity at each pixel is determined by fusing different gray levels and transforming the camera pixel coordinate system into the projector pixel coordinate system. Finally, the adapted fringe patterns are created and used for 3D shape measurement. Experimental results on a flat checkerboard and shiny objects demonstrate that the proposed method can measure shiny surfaces with high accuracy.

Phase analysis of fringe pattern technique has been widely used for three-dimensional shape and deformation measurement by fringe projection method, precise inspection of optical components by various interferometry, etc. To analyze the phase distribution of fringe pattern, more than 80 phase analysis methods have been proposed by many researchers in this research field [1]. For instance, a Fourier transform [2], a wavelet transform, a windowed Fourier transform, and a sampling Moire method [3] have been developed from a single-shot image by using the intensity information in the spatial domain. In addition, the phase-shifting method (PSM) [4], which uses multi-frame phase-shifted fringe patterns is mostly used to analyze the phase distribution by using the intensity information in the temporal domain. However, these techniques only use one-dimensional intensity information in the spatial- or temporal-domains. For this reason, the analyzed phase distribution for noisy fringe pattern remains large measurement error due to the low reflectance of the object and the random noise of the camera.

Phase shifting profilometry is an important technique for reconstructing the three-dimensional (3D) geometry of objects with purely diffuse surfaces. However, it is challenging to measure the transparent objects due to the pattern aliasing caused by light refraction and multiple reflections inside the object. In this work, we analyze the aliasing fringe pattern formation for transparent objects and then, propose to learn the front surface light intensity distribution based on the formation principle by using the diffusion models for generating the non-aliased fringe patterns reflected from the front surface only. With the generated fringe patterns, the 3D shape of the transparent objects can be reconstructed via the conventional structured light. We show the feasibility and performance of the proposed method on the data of purely transparent objects that are not seen in the training stage. Moreover, we found it could be generalized to other cases with local-transparent and translucent objects, showing the potential capability of the diffusion based learnable framework in tackling the problems of transparent object reconstruction.

Measurement is an important means for humans to understand and transform the world, and it is the technological foundation for breaking through the forefront of science and solving major problems in economic and social development. The three-dimensional measurement system serves primary national needs, leads national economic development, and ensures national defense security. With the arrival of a new industrial revolution, major industrial countries worldwide have begun to accelerate the strategic deployment of intelligent manufacturing. As an essential component of the construction of smart factories and lighthouse factories, the 3D measurement system will play a vital role in deepening the implementation of the manufacturing power strategy and promoting the high-end, intelligent, and green manufacturing process. In recent years, optical 3D measurement technology represented by surface structured light has developed rapidly and has been widely applied in multiple material processing fields such as forging, casting, and sheet metal. To analyze the manufacturing accuracy of complex parts using surface structured light 3D measurement technology, it is necessary to first scan and reconstruct the overall 3D surface of the part. The reconstructed 3D point cloud data of the part surface should be roughly and precisely matched with the design model. Finally, based on this, data comparison and accuracy analysis should be carried out according to the actual detection requirements of different types of parts. In this process, the accuracy of 3D reconstruction of complex parts and the alignment accuracy between the reconstruction results and the design model directly determine the reliability and accuracy of the final part manufacturing and machining accuracy analysis. This article uses cases to illustrate the application of machine vision in 3D online measurement. The application of three-dimensional measurement technology in online quality inspection and grinding of blades can not only improve the measurement accuracy of online quality inspection of blades but also maintain the relative stability of robot grinding force and improve the grinding effect in robot grinding of aircraft engine blades. Applied to online quality inspection of train wheel hubs, three-dimensional measurement of train wheel adapters and high-speed train wheel size online inspection has been achieved.

7 - Three-Dimensional Imaging Techniques

In this paper, a whole-field and high-speed optical three-dimensional (3D) shape measurement for the vibration pattern of a drumhead based on Fourier Transform Profilometry (FTP) is presented and verified by experiment. A projected sinusoidal fringe pattern on the surface of measured drumhead is dynamically deformed with the vibration of the membrane and grabbed by a high-speed camera. The 3D shape deformation of the drumhead at each sampling instant can be recovered from demodulating the phase of this obtained sequence of fringe patterns. The vibration of the membrane of a Chinese drum has been measured with a high-speed sampling rate (1,000 fps) and a standard deviation (0.075 mm). This method should be helpful in studying the acoustic characteristic and the manufacture technique of the percussion instrument.

Fringe pattern profilometry using triangular patterns and intensity ratios is a robust and computationally efficient method in three-dimensional shape measurement technique. However, similar to other multiple-shot techniques, the object must be kept static during the process of measurement, which is a challenging requirement for the case of fast-moving objects. Errors will be introduced if the traditional multiple-shot techniques are used directly in the measurement of a moving object. A new method is proposed to address this issue. First, the movement of the object is measured in real time and described by the rotation matrix and translation vector. Then, the expressions are derived for the fringe patterns under the influence of the two-dimensional movement of the object, based on which the normalized fringe patterns from the object without movement are estimated. Finally, the object is reconstructed using the existing intensity ratio algorithm incorporating the fringe patterns estimated, leading to improved measurement accuracy. The performance of the proposed method is verified by experiments.

A simple but effective fringe projection profilometry is proposed to measure 3D shape by using one snapshot color sinusoidal fringe pattern. One color fringe pattern encoded with a sinusoidal fringe (as red component) and one uniform intensity pattern (as blue component) is projected by a digital video projector, and the deformed fringe pattern is recorded by a color CCD camera. The captured color fringe pattern is separated into its RGB components and division operation is applied to red and blue channels to reduce the variable reflection intensity. Shape information of the tested object is decoded by applying an arcsine algorithm on the normalized fringe pattern with subpixel resolution. In the case of fringe discontinuities caused by height steps, or spatially isolated surfaces, the separated blue component is binarized and used for correcting the phase demodulation. A simple and robust method is also introduced to compensate for nonlinear intensity response of the digital video projector. The experimental results demonstrate the validity of the proposed method.

In this paper, a simple method is described for visually demonstrating that the wavelength of light reduces when entering a medium of higher refractive index. When a violet laser (405 nm) is reflected off the surface of a Blu-ray disc (track spacing 320 nm) diffraction cannot occur since the wavelength is greater than the track spacing. However, in water (refractive index 1.33) the wavelength of violet light reduces to 304.5 nm and therefore first-order diffraction can occur when a violet laser is reflected off a Blu-ray disc submerged in water. A violet laser was reflected off a DVD in air, and one diffraction order was seen, but two orders were observed when the disc was immersed in water. Red, green, and violet lasers were reflected off CD, DVD and Blu-ray discs and the number of observed diffraction orders compared with theory. When a violet laser was reflected off a CD in air, three diffraction orders were seen, however five orders were observed in water. The use of tonic water in the experiments enabled the diffraction orders to be seen more easily because violet light causes the quinine in tonic water to fluoresce.

A differential measurement of the ground state Lamb shift in hydrogenic germanium, Ge 31+

A three-beam scanning optical interferometric microscopic technique applied to roughness characterization of optical flats is described. The technique is based on the heterodinization of three coherent optical beams. One of the beams, the probe beam, is focused on the surface under test. A second beam is obtained after being reflected by a reference surface. Finally, the last beam consists of one of the first orders of diffraction that emerges of a Bragg-cell. The three beams are coherently added at the sensitive surface of a photodetector that integrates the overall intensity of the beams. We show analytically that, the electrical signal at the output of the photodetector, is a time-varying signal whose amplitude is proportional to the surface local vertical height. We characterize experimentally the frequency response of the system by measuring the profile of three different gratings. We show measurements of the roughness of an optical flat processed by means of the frequency response of the system.