COMPUTER

VISION

LECTURE 02
 ELECTROMAGNETIC
SPECTRUM
Electromagnetic spectrum: Band of radiations
Radiation: energy that travels and spreads out as it goes.
Light: light is the electromagnetic radiation within a certain portion of
the electromagnetic spectrum.

The electromagnet spectrum arranged according to energy per

photon.
Plank’s constant, or h i.e., h=6.626X10-34 JXS
 ELECTROMAGNETIC
SPECTRUM
• Visible light: Light that comes from a lamp.
• Radio waves: Light that comes from a radio station and are types
of electromagnetic radiation.
• Microwaves
• Infrared
• Ultraviolet
• X-Rays
• Gamma-Rays
• Hotter, more energetic objects and events create higher energy
radiation than cool objects.
• Only extremely hot objects or particles moving at very high
velocities can create high-energy radiation like X-rays and
gamma-rays.
 GAMMA-RAYS
• The highest energy, shortest wavelength electromagnetic
radiations. Usually, they are thought of as any photons having
energies greater than about 100 keV.
• Radioactive materials (Some natural and others made by man in
things like nuclear power plants) can emit gamma-rays.
• Big particle accelerators that scientists use to help them
understand what matter is made of. The biggest gamma-rays
generator of all is the Universe! It makes gamma radiation in all
kinds of ways.
• Major uses of imaging based on gamma rays include nuclear
medicine, the approach is to inject a patient with a radioactive
isotope that emits gamma rays as it decays.
• Images are produced from the emissions collected by gamma ray
detectors.
 X-RAYS
• Electromagnetic radiation of very short wavelength and very high-
energy; X-rays have shorter wavelengths than ultraviolet light but
longer wavelengths than gamma rays.
• Doctors use them to look at bones, Dentist to look at teeth.
• Hot gases in the universe also emit X-rays, X-rays are among the
oldest sources of EM radiation used for imaging.
• The best known use of X-rays is medical diagnostics, but they are
also used extensively in industry and other areas, like astronomy.
• Angiography is another major application in an area called
contrast-enhancement radiography. This procedure is used to
obtain (called angiograms) of blood vessels.
• Perhaps the best known of all uses of X-rays in medical imagining
is computerized Axial Tomography (CAT)
• X-rays, are used to examine circuit boards for flaws in
manufacturing, such as missing components or broken traces.
 ULTRAVIOLET
• Electromagnetic radiation at wavelengths shorter than the
violet end of visible light.
• X-rays, are used to examine circuit boards for flaws in
manufacturing, such as missing components or broken traces.
• Sun is a source of ultraviolet (UV) radiation, because it is the
UV rays that cause our skin to burn! Stars and other “hot”
objects in space emit UV radiation.
• The atmosphere of earth effectively blocks the transmission of
most ultraviolet light.
• Applications of ultraviolet “light” include lithography, industrial
inspection, microscopy, lasers, biological imaging, and
astronomical observations.
 INFRARED
• Electromagnetic radiation at wavelengths longer than the red
end of visible light and shorter than the microwaves (roughly
between 1 and 100 microns)
• Almost none of the infrared portion of electromagnetic
spectrum can reach the surface of earth.
• Applications include light microscopy, astronomy, remote
sensing, industry, and law enforcement.
 THEMATIC BANDS IN NASA’S
LANDSAT SATELLITE
Band Name Wavelength Characteristics and uses
No. (m)
1 Visible Blue 0.45-0.52 Maximum water penetration
2 Visible Green 0.52-0.60 Good for measuring plant vigor
3 Visible Red 0.63-0.69 Vegetation discrimination
4 Near Infrared 0.76-0.90 Biomass and shoreline mapping
5 Middle Infrared 1.55-1.75 Moisture content of soil and
vegetation
6 Thermal Infrared 10.4-12.5 Soil moisture; thermal mapping

LANDSAT satellite obtains and transmits images of Earth from

space for monitoring environmental conditions of the planet.
 MICROWAVE
• Electromagnetic radiation which has a longer wavelength (between 1mm
and 30cm) than visible light
• Microwaves can be used to study the universe, communicate with
satellites in Earth orbit, and cook popcorn
• The dominant application of imaging in the microwave band is radar. The
unique feature of imaging radar is its ability to collect data over virtually
any region at any time, regardless of weather or ambient lighting
conditions.
• Some radar waves can penetrate clouds, and under certain conditions
can also see through vegetation, ice, and extremely dry sand. In many
cases, radar is the only way to explore inaccessible regions of the Earth’s
surface
• An imaging radar works like a flash camera in that it provides its own
illumination (microwaves pulses) to illuminate an area on the ground and
take snapshot image.
• Instead, of a camera lens, a radar uses an antenna and digital computer
processing to record its images.
 RADIO WAVES
• Electromagnetic radiation which has the lowest frequency, the
longest wavelength and is produces by charged particles moving
back and forth.
• The atmosphere of the Earth is transparent to radio waves with
wavelength from a few millimeters to about twenty meters
• Yes, this is the same kind of energy that radio stations emit into
the air for boom box to capture and turn into favorite tunes. But
radio waves are also emitted by other things… such as stars and
gasses in space
• The major applications of imaging in the radio band are in
medicine and astronomy
• In medicine radio waves are used in magnetic response imaging
(MRI)
• This technique places a patient in a powerful magnet and passes
radio waves through his or her body in short pulses.
 ELECTROMAGNET SPECTRUM

Radio waves, visible light, X-rays, and all the other parts of the
electromagnetic Spectrum are fundamentally the same thing,
electromagnetic radiation.
 IMAGING MODALITIES
• Although imaging in the electromagnetic spectrum is dominant by
far, there are a number of other imaging modalities that also are
important.
• Other imaging modalities are:
• Acoustic imaging
• Electron microscopy
• Synthetic (Computer-generated) imaging
• Imaging using “Sound” finds application in
• Geological exploration
• Industry
• Medicine
• Geological applications use sound in the low end of the sound
spectrum (hundreds of Hertz)
• Imaging in other areas use ultrasound (millions of Hertz)
 ULTRASOUND IMAGING
• Ultrasound imaging used routinely in manufacturing
• The best known application of this technique are in medicine,
especially in obstetrics, where unborn babies are imaged to
determine the health of their development
• Obstetrics: the branch of medicine dealing with childbirth and
care of the mother
• Fractal images: are striking examples of computer generated
images