In-camera image optimization at full speed

In order to further improve the image quality of industrial cameras, Basler (Distribution Rauscher) offers the PGI feature set with all new ACE, Dart and Pulse cameras and thus a powerful, patent-pending in-camera image optimization. The unique selling point of PGI is the combination of image sharpness optimization, noise reduction, color anti-aliasing and 5 x 5 debayering.

The feature set has been designed taking into account a very slim and resource efficient implementation. The camera reserves as at PGI activated to full speed and does not require cost-increasing measures such as a larger internal memory or other computing units. By performing in-camera PGI is fully capable of real time and ensures a significant reduction of latency.
PGI allows users thus not only a faster image processing and therefore a higher throughput, it also allows cost savings in the image processing chain and delivers consistently a significantly enhanced image quality.

With the Basler "pylon" Software Suite can enable or adjust the settings for individual PGI-components the PGI features. The PGI-feature set delivers through its image structure adapted interpolation algorithm significantly improved image sharpness than the conventional Frabkameras can. This can be increased by an additional enhancement factor further. This improvement is of use primarily in applications where color cameras record letters or numbers or other fine and sharp-edged structures such as bar codes and have to process.

In color cameras comes for gray noise even color noise added, the results and strengthened through which a series of calculation steps and interpolations. PGI considered and avoids this kind of noise formation in advance by all together and parallelization of computational operations. An active noise filtering reduces the noise level additionally. The use of debayering algorithms can easily lead to false color in recorded images. PGI uses an extended information space at debayering and simultaneously corrects the incorrect colors.

Usually offer cameras 2 2 x-debayering in which the two nearest pixels are taken into account when calculating the actual color of an image. This leads partly to uneven edges between colors, and other artifacts. By 5 5 x-debayering from the feature set of this transition between different colors clear and the artifacts will disappear entirely. Simultaneously, the optimized debayering contributes to noise reduction.