Lighting primer

There’s a useful introduction to machine vision lighting up on the Automated Imaging Association (AIA) website: “Shedding Light on Machine Vision” by Microscan Systems Inc.. It covers a lot of ground in a short space, so don’t treat it as anything other than a reminder of some of the basic tricks and techniques, but it is worth a few minutes of your time.

There’s an interesting back story here. Microscan made their name in the code-reading/part identification business. If I need to read a bar code, I go to either Cognex or Microscan, so what are they doing providing advice on machine vision lighting?

Well some time ago (October 2008, if memory serves,) Microscan acquired the old NER lighting business from Siemens when the latter decided machine vision wasn’t for them. At that time NER had a guy who consistently delivered one of the best “Basics of Machine Vision Lighting” talks that I’ve ever had the pleasure of hearing, and he had a great selection of case studies and examples. Well he moved on and, to be honest, Microscan didn’t seem to put much effort into promoting their lighting business, but apparently someone has dusted off the old material and decided it’s time to push it once more.

Here’s the link you’ve been waiting for: Machine vision lighting from Microscan.