Sleeps with the fishes

VIDEO: Dreadful things may happen to vision systems designers who fail to find components that stand the test of time...

Editor's Note: Watch the video version of editor Andy Wilson's "My View" blog, where you'll get Andy's unique take on what's buzzing through the machine-vision marketplace or just what's been buzzing through his mind lately. You can also read Andy's "My View" as seen in the November issue of Vision Systems Design.

Arms Trafficking

VIDEO: Beware, system integrators--you may run afoul of regulations that limit the export of frequently used machine-vision components...

Editor's Note: Watch the video version of editor Andy Wilson's "My View" blog, where you'll get Andy's unique take on what's buzzing through the machine-vision marketplace or just what's been buzzing through his mind lately. You can also read Andy's "My View" as seen in the October issue of Vision Systems Design.

Information is power

VIDEO: Better online search tools will help system integrators explore the often fog-bound world of machine-vision products, trends, and market opportunities...

Editor's Note: Watch the video version of editor Andy Wilson's "My View" blog, where you'll get Andy's unique take on what's buzzing through the machine-vision marketplace or just what's been buzzing through his mind lately. You can also read Andy's "My View" as seen in the September issue of Vision Systems Design.

Men at Work

VIDEO: Rather than wasting energy battling over code, machine-vision software makers would do better to take a lesson in sampling from the music industry...

Editor's Note: Watch the video version of editor Andy Wilson's "My View" blog, where you'll get Andy's unique take on what's buzzing through the machine-vision marketplace or just what's been buzzing through his mind lately. You can also read Andy's "My View" as seen in the August issue of Vision Systems Design.

Pushing buttons

VIDEO: Describing the technology behind a product will do more to win customers than selling based on simplistic marketing techniques

Editor's Note: Watch the video version of editor Andy Wilson's "My View" blog, where you'll get Andy's unique take on what's buzzing through the machine-vision marketplace or just what's been buzzing through his mind lately. You can also read Andy's "My View" as seen in the June issue of Vision Systems Design.

In developing new products, many software vendors leverage simple point, neighborhood, and global algorithms such as histogram equalization and Fourier analysis in their products—functions that are now commonplace and well documented, having been developed and used extensively over the past 50 years.

Newer and more novel algorithms dealing with image transformation, mapping, pattern matching, and image classification are also well-documented in journals such as the IEEE Transactions on Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence (PAMI).

Empty garden

VIDEO: Managing a machine-vision company can require the skills of a good gardener, notably one who nourishes new growth

Editor's Note: Watch the video version of editor Andy Wilson's "My View" blog, where you'll get Andy's unique take on what's buzzing through the machine-vision marketplace or just what's been buzzing through his mind lately. You can also read Andy's "My View" as seen in the May issue of Vision Systems Design.

As many of our readers are well aware, I was not born in the United States. In fact, I was born in a sleepy village in the county of Bedfordshire, England. To check the ties that bind, I often visit my wayward twin brother Dave. Being the potential management type, I duly inspect how my brother is keeping his house and his half-an-acre garden.

Since I only visit a few times a year, it always appears that the garden is little changed.

Bad shoes

VIDEO: With the aid of machine vision, long-term product testing strategies are essential to ensure that only the highest quality goods reach the market.

Editor's Note: Watch the video version of editor Andy Wilson's "My View" blog, where you'll get Andy's unique take on what's buzzing through the machine-vision marketplace or just what's been buzzing through his mind lately. You can also read Andy's "My View" as seen in the April issue of Vision Systems Design.

Hobbling around trade shows is very wearying, especially on the feet and connecting appendages. I should know. I have attended many such events and due to a lack of exercise -- coupled with my love of Dunhill International cigarettes -- have often been laid up in bed for days afterward. After one event my boss, Conard Holton, noticed that it was perhaps my poor choice of footwear that may be contributing to my condition. After months of procrastinating, I went to my local shoe store and found a rather nice pair of very inexpensive shoes. Even my boss had to admire how smart I looked.

This year, I realized that the early recognition of a potential problem was not confined just to my shoes but to the shoes of one of the world’s greatest car manufacturers.

A little knowledge

VIDEO: By adding intelligence to their products, vendors will reduce the need for software development by their customers while opening a path to even more sophisticated systems.

Editor's Note: Watch the video version of editor Andy Wilson's "My View" blog, where you'll get Andy's unique take on what's buzzing through the machine-vision marketplace or just what's been buzzing through his mind lately. You can also read Andy's "My View" as seen in the February issue of Vision Systems Design.

Anyone who has been involved with computer vision for a number of years will testify that much work needs to be done before machine-vision systems can emulate the power of the human visual system. Despite hardware advances in multicore CPUs, DSPs, GPUs, and FPGAs, researchers are still far from modeling how the human brain perceives and understands the visual world.

Yet many machine-vision systems require only simple measurement tasks to be performed. It is often not necessary to perform sophisticated image-processing functions to analyze image features. In these cases, simpler algorithms such as edge detection, histogram analysis, thresholding, and blob analysis can be used to perform a desired image-analysis function.

A possible inconvenience

VIDEO: Innovative 'new economy' ideas for marketing machine-vision products may have an unexpected cost--time

Editor's Note: Watch the video version of editor Andy Wilson's "My View" blog, where you'll get Andy's unique take on what's buzzing through the machine-vision marketplace or just what's been buzzing through his mind lately. You can also read Andy's "My View" as seen in the January issue of Vision Systems Design.

Several years ago, I had the pleasure of attending a talk presented by Chris Anderson, the author of The Long Tail (http://www.thelongtail.com/). If you have read this book, you will be aware of its simple but powerful message.

In essence, Anderson points out that the economy is shifting away from a focus on a relative small number of mainstream products and markets at the head of the demand curve and toward a huge number of niches in the tail.

Take a bow

Editor's Note: Watch the video version of editor Andy Wilson's "My View" blog, where you'll get Andy's unique take on what's buzzing through the machine-vision marketplace or just what's been buzzing through his mind lately. You can also read Andy's "My View" as seen in the December issue of Vision Systems Design.

America's Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) encompasses radio and television stations that transmit some of the finest programming in the country. Before tuning in to the Fox News channel to hear biased right-wing reporting (while at the same time having a few laughs), I always check whether my local public station is broadcasting something more important.

One night, I tuned into a concert by Hector Berlioz called the Symphonie Fantastique being broadcast on WGBH in Boston. Conducting the orchestra was a certain Michael Tilson Thomas, an American conductor, pianist, and composer who is currently musical director of the San Francisco Symphony. (Watch the video below.)