Machine vision software for automated inspection

18th October 2006

NI-Emerson

ES Admin

0 0

National Instruments has announced NI Vision Builder for Automated Inspection Version 3.0, the latest upgrade to the interactive software for configuring, benchmarking and deploying complete machine vision applications without programming. This version introduces a new state-machine process model that gives engineers one of the most flexible environments available for configuring vision systems.

With this process model, engineers can customise the execution flow of their inspections to meet a wide variety of machine vision challenges, from component alignment to part inspection and verification. Through the use of state machines, Vision Builder AI now combines the flexibility of a programming language with the ease of use of a configuration environment.

Most configurable vision software packages rely on sequential inspection steps that leave little room for customising the execution flow. Now, with the state-machine process model within Vision Builder AI, engineers can graphically customise the flow of their applications with conditional branches or iterative loops, allowing a single inspection to dynamically adjust with each new image. With Vision Builder AI 3.0, engineers can solve most machine vision application challenges without the use of a programming language or complicated customisation tools. Also, because state machines are inherently self-documenting, they provide engineers with an intuitive way to organise vision applications and share information easily among colleagues.

Vision Builder AI also includes new algorithms for golden template comparison, optical character verification (OCV) and data matrix grading that are designed to help engineers identify quality errors earlier in production. To communicate results, Vision Builder AI now works with all NI-DAQmx-compatible hardware devices, enabling engineers to read and write digital and analogue inspection information to any NI-DAQmx-compatible device, such as M Series data acquisition (DAQ) or NI CompactDAQ devices.

With Vision Builder AI, engineers can acquire images from thousands of off-the-shelf cameras, including Camera Link, IEEE 1394, and GigE Vision, and process images with more than 100 powerful machine vision tools, including geometric matching, OCR and particle analysis. Inspections developed with Vision Builder AI can run on any PC, the NI Compact Vision System or the Sony Smart Camera.