Array Scanner as Microdensitometer Surrogate: A Deal with the Devil or... a Great Deal

摘要

Inexpensive and easy-to-use linear and area-array scanners have frequently substituted as densitometers for low-frequency (i.e., large-area) hard copy image metrology. A number of workers and standards committees' have in fact advocated such use. Increasingly, scanners are also being tasked for high spatial frequency, image microstructure metrology (which is usually reserved for high-performance microdensitometers that use microscope optics), photomultiplier tubes (PMT), and log amps. It is hard to resist their adoption for such use, given the convenience level. The high speed, large scan areas, auto-focus, discomfiting low cost, and low operator skill requirements of commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) scanners makes one question if their use for such purpose is somehow too good to be true. To confidently judge their limitations requires a comprehensive signal and noise spatial frequency performance evaluation with respect to available driver options. This paper will outline and demonstrate evaluation techniques that use existing ISO metrology standards for modulation transfer function (MTF), noise, and dynamic range with a comparison to the performance of a Photometric Data Systems (PDS) microdensitometer.