need help with image recognition and analysis

[chemostris]

Hello, 

I am trying to develop a machine vision system to read and measure a liquid height in a tube vs. time. in my experiments, The foam decreases in a tube and I need to measure the height every second or so. I want to automate this experiment. I want the instrument to recognize the height and give me height vs time graph. 

I am a beginner, so I need to know what software I need and if there is any template for coding, and what kind of high-speed camera I need. thank you so much for your assistance. 

[cweeks12]

There are a couple considerations to make.

1. Lighting. You have to make sure that your lighting is good, meaning giving enough contrast between what you're looking at and the background so that you can see the distinct edge where your foam is. Good lighting will help your programming be easier and prevent a ton of issues down the road.

2. Camera. Here's a little article on different kinds of cameras you can use: https://www.ni.com/en/shop/choosing-the-right-hardware-for-your-vision-applications/choosing-the-rig...To use a camera with our software, it has to be one of the types of cameras called out in this article: Cameras Supported by National Instruments. They have to be compliant with whatever standard you go with. I would suggest for you to get a USB3Vision camera.

3. Lens (and a bit of camera). This article can explain how to choose your camera sensor size and the lens: Calculating Camera Sensor Resolution and Lens Focal Length

4. Software. You'll need a license for the Vision Development Module and LabVIEW. This comes with a license for the Vision Acquisition Software on the same computer. 

5. Design pattern. It will probably be as easy as finding an edge where the top of the foam is, and measuring the distance from there to another known point to interpolate the distance.

Hopefully that gets you up and running!