Process and quality vision system
Process and Quality Vision - New vision technology for WMS and WIS applications - for the unique requirements of the paper industry.
Vision Technology is one of today’s fastest growing technologies. New applications will assist us in our everyday life by providing more precision, more detailed information and improved safety. The development of this kind of technology is so rapid that the typical large, long-standing organization either cannot keep up or, more likely, will have vested interests which stand in the way. Only lean specialist organizations with clear targets, strong financing and the right technical expertise - and no historical burden - can stay in the race. Viconsys was created to match these requirements. It has the required drive and focus to start a new era in Machine vision industry.
There are many mainstream drivers in vision technology. None of these drivers will produce a ready application for the paper industry. But they can provide the essential ingredients for a lean focused organization to create a new solution for existing paper industry needs.
Camera Technology
The main drivers are digital cameras, mobile phones and security cameras. New cameras will be faster, more sensitive, and have better resolution. Typically, these days their performance is almost doubling every year. These new cameras will change the way machine vision systems for the paper industry have been designed. Keywords today are Megapixel cameras with controlled frame size and speeds of over 1000 frames/second, fiber optics transmission, and intelligent cameras.
Image Analysis
The main driver is security systems and the main technological advance in image analysis is new high performance mathematics specifically designed to isolate objects of interest in an image such as suspiciously behaving people in a crowd. This new high performance image analysis is ideally suited to the demands of a fast running paper machine. Now all events which present a disturbance or quality problem can be identified, categorized and traced to source - in real time.
Data Processing Power
This new image analysis mathematics needs huge processing power. Per camera, it is no exaggeration to say that this could be equivalent to dozens of the fastest PCs. Fortunately there is an increasing need for greater image processing power in the mainstream technologies of Digital TV and DVDs. Special FPGA and DSP processors optimized for image processing have been developed to handle such requirements. Viconsys’ processing power per camera is equivalent to that used in complex radar systems and will allow true real time analysis of hundreds of images per second in each camera. At the same time the compact structure of the Viconsys system greatly enhances its reliability.
Software Technology
Totally open systems are a must today. The use of internet technology permits information networks to be built without special customizing or client arrangements. The Net is our main software environment. All the data is arranged in an SQL-database which distributes information throughout the network.
All these and many more new technologies are base elements in the new Viconsys Process and Quality Vision System. They are the product of a team combining the technological developments and background experience with the highest number of installed WMS and WIS systems in the paper industry.
Signal Routing
Signal routing has great influence on image quality. After receiving an image from camera it has to be transferred to processing. Viconsys uses fibre optics to avoid noise and distance restrictions in signal routing. Two way data traffic is used to ensure remote controlling in addition to normal image transfer.
Traditional signal routing is made with coaxial cables. Various electrical devices and wiring in the mills generates noise into signal transferred and therefore destroys important details from images. Coaxial cable has also distance restrictions which may cause additional problems for signal routing.
