IMAGE-PROCESSING PROCEDURES FOR ANALYSIS OF ELECTRON BACK SCATTERING PATTERNS

At present, computer-aided Electron Back Scattering Pattern (EBSP) analysis often requires large amounts of operator time if statistically reliable measurements are needed. This paper presents ways to automatically detect and localize bands in EBSPs and thereby enable fully automatic EBSP analysis. The main focus will be on a procedure using a modified Hough transform by which more than 12 bands in a typical EBSP can be detected and localized. This procedure seems as effective and reliable for extracting the bands of EBSPs as any human operator. The performance of this procedure is compared with that of other image processing procedures.