Particle removal inspection using the image mask for electronic paper manufacturing

In this study, we propose a particle inspection method by using the image mask so as to evaluate the removal efficiency of unwanted particles in electronic paper manufacturing. In the image processing, the particles lies on the ribs are only considered except for the particles inside of each pixel. The proposed method creates an image mask which is suitable for the e-paper panel. The created image mask is aligned with a source image which is taken from a microscope. The resultant masked image is binarized and then particle analysis is performed by using it. Consequently, the total area occupied only by the undesirable particles is calculated over a whole panel to evaluate the removal efficiency.