3m Innovative Properties Company

3m Innovation Properties Company

John A Ramthun

Derek H Justice

Evan J Ribnick

David L Hofeldt

Catherine P Tarnowski

Wenyuan Xu

Guillermo Sapiro

Kenneth G Brittain

Gregory D Kostuch

Steven P Floeder

David D Miller

Jack Wing Lai

Lanny L Harklau

Andrzej P Jaworski

Esa H Vilkama

Arthur T Manning

A method for characterizing the uniformity of a material includes selecting a set of size scales at which to measure uniformity within an area of interest in an image of the material; suppressing features in the image smaller than a selected size scale of interest within the set of size scales; dividing the image into patches equal to the size scale of interest; and calculating a uniformity value within each patch.

Multiscale uniformity analysis of a material

A computerized inspection system is described for detecting the presence of non-uniformity defects and providing output indicative of a severity of each type of non-uniformity defect. Techniques are described that increase the throughput of the inspection system. Algorithmic and hardware approaches are described to significantly decrease the average amount of time required to inspect a given quantity of material that is expected to be mostly uniform. The techniques described herein involve dynamic selection of which image features to compute by starting with a base feature set and only triggering additional feature computations as needed until the features are sufficient to compute a severity for each type of non-uniformity defect. The number of features extracted and the order in which the features are extracted is dynamically determined in real-time to reduce a cost associated with the feature extraction.

Rapid processing and detection of non-uniformities in web-based materials

A system is described for detecting the presence of non-uniformity patterns and providing output indicative of a severity of each type of non-uniformity pattern. The system includes a computerized rating tool that assists a user in efficiently and consistently assigning expert ratings (i.e., labels) to a large collection of training images representing samples of a given product. In addition, the rating software develops a model that allows a computerized inspection system to detect the presence of non-uniformity patterns in a manufactured web material in real time and provide output indicative of a severity level of each pattern on a continuous scale. The system also includes algorithmic and hardware approaches to significantly that increase the throughput of the inspection system.

System for detection of non-uniformities in web-based materials

Systems and methods for calibrating a web inspection system.

Web inspection calibration system and related methods

A method and apparatus for measuring the thickness of a coating on a coated surface. The method uses a solid state array of light-sensitive elements to measure light emitted from a fluorescing coating composition. The intensity of the emitted light corresponds to the thickness of the coating composition, and provides a fast and accurate measure of coating thickness.

Low cost thickness measurement method and apparatus for thin coatings

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Hudson, WI, United States of America

John A Ramthun