Image Analysis for Measuring Motion Parameters with a CCD Camera

A PC based measuring system which is used for analysing images from a simple CCD camera to provide information about motion parameters is presented in this work. The proposed approach has been developed for measuring small movements of micro robotic systems based on synthetic IPMC materials. The technique is based on processing the information from a fast analysis of subsequent images of the moving item. As the time of each frame in video recording is known, the software developed implements a graphic depiction of the movement (position or speed) in relation with time. The process uses a mechanism of localisation of the place of the interested item and has the capability for measurements of any movement with satisfactory accuracy. This method is particularly useful for monitoring movement of wings or arms in micro-robotics applications.