Review of some advances and applications in real-time high-speed vision: Our views and experiences

The frame rate of conventional vision systems is restricted to the video signal formats (e.g., NTSC 30 fps and PAL 25 fps) that are designed on the basis of the characteristics of the human eye, which implies that the processing speed of these systems is limited to the recognition speed of the human eye. However, there is a strong demand for real-time high-speed vision sensors in many application fields, such as factory automation, biomedicine, and robotics, where high-speed operations are carried out. These high-speed operations can be tracked and inspected by using high-speed vision systems with intelligent sensors that work at hundreds of Hertz or more, especially when the operation is difficult to observe with the human eye. This paper reviews advances in developing real-time high speed vision systems and their applications in various fields, such as intelligent logging systems, vibration dynamics sensing, vision-based mechanical control, three-dimensional measurement/automated visual inspection, vision-based human interface, and biomedical applications.