Preliminary Results of Computer Aided Acoustic Imaging

Abstract

Preliminary results from a computer aided coherent acoustic imaging system are given. The system uses a raster scanned sensor to digitize samples of 1 MHz acoustic fields (both amplitude and phase) sampled at half-wavelength intervals. After transferring the data to computer memory three different types of displays have been used to display and process the data fields as images. The display devices include a black and white video system, a color graphics terminal, and a high resolution color image processing system. The advantages and disadvantages of each display system are discussed along with some of the most useful image processing operations for the acoustic images obtained. These operations include image zoom (i.e., magnification), histogram analysis, dynamic range manipulation, and other interactive capabilities.