ADEEL ZAFAR

CEE 498KUC – Experimental Methods in Structures and Materials

March 14th, 2008
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 Non-contact, optical technique for obtaining full-
field deformation
 It uses image processing to go from several images
of material, and to then calculate the deformation at
any point in the field , and to then find deformation
and strain values
 Introduction to DIC
 History and Developments
 Concept and Approach
 Methodology
 Theoretical background
 Calibration
 DIC-3D
 Various Tests and Results
 Advantages and Disadvantages
 Applications
 Conclusion

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 What is DIC?
 It is computer based process to obtain a 2-D full field
information by recording deformation and motion of
speckle patterns on a specimen surface before and after
deformation of the body
 It takes advantage of the fact that applied stresses change
both the thickness and optical properties of materials, to
determine displacement
 Why need DIC?

Although the bulk macroscale testing provides useful

information about materials but many process occur at
microscale and nanoscale. As a result testing methods are
required to have that resolution and capture results at that
level
 Developed in the early ’80s at the University of South
Carolina to measure full-field in-plane displacements and
displacement gradients of a strained body at the macroscale
 1987 – Methodology to measure crack initiation mode &
stress intensity factor in brittle materials
 1988 – Mixed-mode loading
 1992 – 3D effects near a crack tip
 1997 – Deformations measured in micron and nanometer
scales
 Contd….

 1997 – Plastic deformation patterns in ductile materials

 1998 – Method to evaluate large deformations
 2002 – Professor Lambros constructed crack growth
resistance curves for functionally graded materials
 It is less demanding optically-
ordinary incoherent light is
sufficient and no need for
optical components
 Requires one Hi resolution
camera for 2D displacement
and for 3D displacement, 2
cameras
 A computer and frame
grabbing circuit card to digitize
the output
 It is very simple in concept
 Digital camera takes picture of
surface of the specimen
 Image is downloaded from
camera to a frame grabbing
circuit card
 Analog signal from CCD array
are then digitized
 The data is stored for
subsequent processing
 Surface of specimen is sprayed with
target pattern
 This is photographed before and
after specimen is deformed
 Digital image of specimen contains
intensity measurements at each
pixel location on CCD (charge
couple device-sensor) array before
and after
 Using target features and their
location, displacement field is
generated
 Accuracy upto 0.02 pixels have
been achieved
 Camera with CCD array(Has small
photosensitive cells and high pixel count)
records intensity of light falling on a pixel.
 Array in high resolution camera is rectangular
with thousand or more pixels per line and a
thousand or more lines per image. (3x3 pixel)
 Signal from CCD array is digitized and gives
100 0 100 100 0 100
a reading of the light intensity for each pixel.
0 0 0 0 50 0
Intensity readings are shown as 0 from dark
100 0 100 100 0 100
pixels and 100 for light pixel(Grey Scale)
 Storage of image into pixel and combination
of pixel is called CONVOLUTION
 To locate the target from
intensity data on pixel array,
DIC uses intensity pattern
matching method called
CORRELATION
 This is done by defining the 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 50 50 100 100 50 50 100

subset of pixels that surround 100 100 0 100 100 100 0 100 100 100 50 0 0 50 50 50 0 50

the key feature on target 100 0

100 100
0

0
0 100 0

100 100 100

50

0
0 100

100 100
100 100 50 50 100 100 50 50 100

100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100

 Matching two patterns 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100

establishes target displacement Initial After

 If you have same type of
target, then it would be
impossible to distinguish
between them
 Need to have unique shape for
each point
 This is achieved with
“speckles”
 Speckle should cover at least
3x3 pixel area
 Techniques in creating speckles are :-
 For small speckles-Spraying white paint and sprinkling of carbon
particles
 For moderate speckles-Spraying white paint and the black paint is
sprayed with light pass
 For large speckles-Spraying white paint and brushing black paint
 For very high resolution- Fluorescent paint is used
 It is done based on
algorithm for matching
intensity field of many
speckles because of
richness of intensity data as
compared to individual
speckle matching
Speckles must be custom made to fit the scale of
observation. Thus, for the nanoscale, a smaller
speckle pattern must be used than for the
macroscale.

Macroscale Nanoscle
 Typical digital
image captured by
CCD camera

 Corresponding
intensity profile as
a surface plot
 2-D deformation
 In-plane displacement
 Strain fields
 Known discrete
functions
 f(x,y)—Undeformed
 g(x’,y’)—Deformed
 Components of displacement vector of point p in x
and y direction:

vp

up
  Position of any point can be defined by correlation
functions:

 Use above equations to solve for displacement

vector :
 Correlation involves comparison of intensity data of two
pixel fields. Mapping the coordinates between the two fields
is accomplished by using:-
 X = x+u(x,y)
 Y= y+v(x.y)
 Matching process involves minimizing coefficient that
measure how well both configuration compare
 Two different coefficient have been used to compare
accuracy
 Least-square correlation coefficient
 Cross-correlation coefficient

 is a light intensity value (grayscale level)

is corresponding intensity value of

the same point q after deformation
 Digital Image contains thousands of pixels with
different gray scale values. Usually they change
abruptly
 This produces mathematical difficulties when
determining mapping parameter
 Therefore data is smoothed over the entire field in both
images. Process is called INTERPOLATION
 Interpolation over the intensity
values of deformed configuration is
needed to determine these sub-pixel
location intensity values
 Following interpolation schemes are
generally used;-
 Bilinear

 Cubic

 Both interpolations approximates

intensity value of any point that lies
between pixels
 Two methods exist:-
 Coarse-Fine method. “Brute force” approach in which minimization coefficients
are computed for a wide range of values and are minimized independently. Time
consuming
 Newton-Raphson method . All coefficients are minimized simultaneously. Faster

 The process involves in obtaining optimum solution by searching over

given range for the deformation parameters
 Determination of Magnification factor
 Relates to dimension on specimen to a corresponding dimension on
the image plane of camera
 Location of lens center
 Center of camera lens should coincide with center of area of interest
 Lens Distortion
 Lens with long focal lengths are employed to minimize lens distortion
 Measurement of 3D component
on a specimen is much more
difficult
 2 CCD cameras are employed
 Procedure is to get image from
both cameras and then develop
stereo imaging equations before
correlation process
Live field Deformation vector field Strain field
Contour plot of displacement
Live field Deformation vector field Strain field
 Preparation of the specimen is relatively simple as the speckle
patterns used as unique targets are made by spray painting its surface.
 Ordinary white light is used to illuminate the surface of the specimen.
 Specimen size is not an issue as the method can be applied to both
large and small specimens. Specimen size is accommodated by
changing the magnification used in recording the image.
 The method is not overly sensitive to vibration and a vibration
isolation table is not necessary. However, it is essential that both the
specimen and the camera be stable during the time required to record
the image.
 Large strains or significant rigid body movement does not cause
difficulties if the specimen does not move out of the field of view of
the camera.
 Sensitive to fluctuation and nonuniformity of light intensity
 Measuring out of plain displacement requires more
equipment and expertise
 Mathematics involved is challenging
 The calibration process is tedious
 Professional development
 LaVision’s StrainMaster
 Correlation Solution in Biomechanics
 Research development

Velocity vectors in displacement zone

of steel during cold-rolling process
 DIC is a non-contact method for measuring whole field displacement
 Method involves interpolation to smooth gray scale levels and then
applies coefficient to map the parameters to find strains
 Mathematics involved is challenging, but if computer code is
available, mapping process becomes automatic
 Accuracy is often quoted as  0.02 pixels for each displacement
component. Accuracy depends on:-
 Interpolation schemes
 Lens distortion
 Uniformity of light distribution
 Quality of speckle pattern
 http://www.airframer.com/news_story.html?release=108

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_image_correlation

 Thesis by JAY K. Patel on DIC for microscale and nanoscale

deformation measurements

 Thesis by Jorge Luis Abanto-bueno on Fracture Modeling

 Structural Engineering Seminar by Prof Lambros