Importance

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Abstract

An illumination system having a lighting dome, a vertical light source, an image acquisition means, and a light controlling means, a system controller and a three-axis servo system wherein the dome is of unitary printed circuit board construction populated with a plurality of surface mounted light emitting diodes is disclosed. The dome has a first longitudinal axis and is bendable along hinges formed through the circuit board to define a partially enclosed dome having eight octants or sections, each section having an upper and lower tier portion defining a plurality of planar illumination banks, which illuminate an object from 360.degree. around the object and from predetermined angles relative to the first longitudinal axis. The vertical light source, which is a planar printed circuit board populated with surface mounted LEDs, and the beam splitter are provided for illumination of the object with light parallel to the first longitudinal axis. The planar geometry of the illumination banks and the vertical lighting source cause the LEDs to emit light rays that are substantially parallel. The light controlling means controls the intensity of each section and tier portion through pulse width modulation of the respective plurality of light emitting diodes. The acquisition means is provided for acquiring reflected light rays to generate an image of the illuminated object. The increased density of the surface mounted diodes increase the light intensity produced over known illumination systems employing conventional LED mounting techniques. Moreover, the light controlling means can be programmed via the system controller to light any of the panels at a selected intensity. The system controller control the servo system to move the acquisition means in any of three axis so that the acquisition means can capture an image of a preselected area of the object. The system controller processes the captured image to detect a feature of the object.

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First Claim