OPTICAL THREE-DIMENSIONAL DIGITAL IMAGING AND MENSURATION SYSTEM FOR INDUSTRIAL APPLICATIONS

摘要

An image acquisition arrangement that acquires at least one image of at least one portion of a scene, the image acquisition arrangement (10) comprising a camera (14A) and an illumination source (20) controlled by a control module. The camera (14A) includes an image recording medium and a shutter controllable to enable the image recording medium to acquire the image. The illumination source (20) is configured to illuminate the scene for a selected time period. The control module controls the camera (14A) and illumination source (20) to facilitate acquisition of the image by the camera (14A), the control module enabling the shutter of the at least one camera (14A) to, in turn, enable the image recording medium to acquire the image and contemporaneously to enable the illumination source (20) to illuminate the scene, the time period during which the shutter enables the image recording medium to record an image being a function of the time period during which the at least one illumination source (20) illuminates the scene. In another aspect, the image acquisition arrangement comprises a plurality of cameras (14A) mounted on a support, each camera (14A) having an image recording medium, the cameras (14A) and support (12) being constructed of materials having respective coefficients of thermal expansion and configured to maintain the cameras' image recording media in fixed relation to each other. In yet another aspect, the image acquisition arrangement comprises at least one camera (14A) comprising an image recording medium configured to generate signals in electrical form representative of an image, the image recording medium being housed in a housing (21), the housing (21) being configured to shield the image recording medium from electro-magnetic interference originating outside of the housing (21). In other aspects, other elements of the image acquisition arrangement, including power supplies that provide power to the at least one camera (14A), and communication links (18) linking the at least one camera (14A) to an image processing subsystem (13), are also relatively impervious to electro-magnetic interference.