Shape extraction of low-textured objects in video microscopy

Robust Focus Volume Regularization in Shape From Focus

Shape from focus (SFF) reconstructs 3D shape of the scene from a sequence of multi-focus images, and the quality of reconstructed shape mainly depends on the accuracy of image focus volume (FV). Traditional SFF techniques exhibit poor performance in preserving structural edges and fine details while removing noisy artifacts, and mostly they do not incorporate any additional shape prior. Therefore, in this paper, we propose to refine FV by formulating an energy minimization framework that employs a nonconvex regularizer and incorporates two types of shape priors. The proposed regularizer is robust against noisy focus values. The first proposed shape prior is input image sequence and it is a single and static shape prior. While, the second shape prior corresponds to a series of shape priors. These shape priors are FVs which are iteratively obtained on-the-fly. Both of these shape priors constrain the solution space for output FV. We optimize nonconvex energy function through majorize-minimization algorithm which iteratively guarantees a local minimum and converges quickly. Experiments have been conducted to evaluate accuracy and convergence properties of the proposed method. Experimental results of synthetic and real image sequences demonstrate that our method achieves superior results in terms of ability to reconstruct accurate 3D shapes as compared to existing approaches.

Depth estimation method of surface of micropart in microassembly space based on microscopic vision tomographic scanning images

Three-dimensional (3D) morphology of microparts has an important influence on performance of microassembly system that mainly assembles microparts in millimetre and micron scale. Because 3D morphology of microparts cannot be accurately obtained by conventional microscopic vision system, a depth estimation method of surface of micropart in microassembly space based on microscopic vision tomographic scanning (MVTS) images is proposed in this paper. The proposed method uses the positions of pixels with the largest focus values in MVTS image to construct the isodepth contours of surface of micropart and obtains the depth values of micropart's surface at the positions of MVTS by assigning depth values to corresponding isodepth contours. The MVTS images are obtained by MVTS and pixels with the largest focus values in MVTS image are obtained by focus measurement of MVTS images of micropart in microassembly space. On these bases, 3D spatial interpolation method is applied to map depth value of space between adjacent isodepth contours and to obtain depth values of all surface of micropart. Simulation experiments are carried out to verify the proposed method by generating simulated MVTS image array from two simulation objects, and the influence parameters of the proposed method are analysed. In established experimental setup of microassembly that can realise MVTS, experimental verification for the proposed depth estimation method are carried out by using cone cavity and end jaws of microgripper. 3D morphologies of depth maps of cone cavity and end jaws of microgripper are registered with their respective CAD models using iterative nearest point registration algorithm to quantify accuracy of depth estimation. The research results show that 3D morphology of micropart can be obtained by the proposed method and has better accuracy than those by conventional shape from focus method. This method provides a new way to obtain the morphology of microparts and lays a foundation for improving the accuracy and efficiency of gripping, alignment and approaching microparts in microassembly systems.