Imatest is proud to announce the official release of its new 4.0 image quality testing software. The Imatest 4.0 upgrade includes a number of refinements including enhanced automation capabilities and a more robust image quality testing experience. Improvements are found across all three of Imatest’s core products: Master, IS (Image Sensor) and IT (Industrial Testing). Below is an in-depth and complete list of all Imatest 4.0 enhancements. (more…)
January 2015 Newsletter
Imatest is excited to announce our new Chrome on Glass Target sizes. We have increased our target selection from 2″ x 2″ Chrome on Glass SFRplus Targets to a variety of sizes and highly customizable solutions. The chrome on glass substrate provides extremely high resolution targets to satisfy a variety of testing needs. We offer larger targets for customers using high resolution cameras within compact testing systems, as well as extremely small targets for testing equipment like endoscopes and microscopes at varying magnifications.
Imatest December 2014 Newsletter
Wishing all our customers, partners and resellers very happy holidays and a prosperous New Year. Imatest is offering 25% off all software support renewals through the end of the year.
Imatest 4.0 Release
Slanted-Edge versus Siemens Star: A comparison of sensitivity to signal processing
This post addresses concerns about the sensitivity of slanted-edge patterns to signal processing, especially sharpening, and corrects the misconception that sinusoidal patterns, such as the Siemens star (included in the ISO 12233:2014 standard), are insensitive to sharpening, and hence provide more robust and stable MTF measurements.
To summarize our results, we found that the Siemens Star (and other sinusoidal patterns) are nearly as sensitive as slanted-edges to sharpening, and that slanted-edges give reliable MTF measurements that correspond to the human eye’s perception of sharpness. (more…)
Imatest for Mac OS X 3.10-Beta Now Available
We are happy to announce that Imatest Master 3.10-Beta is now available for Mac OS X
We are confident in the stability of the image quality testing algorithms in this version, but have kept the Beta tag on this release since there may be some minor issues that remain to be resolved before we remove the Beta tag. (more…)
Sharpness and Texture Analysis using Log F‑Contrast from Imaging-Resource
Imaging-resource.com publishes images of the Imatest Log F-Contrast* chart in its excellent camera reviews. These images contain valuable information about camera quality— how sharpness and texture response are affected by image processing— but they need to be processed by Imatest to reveal the important information they contain.
*F is an abbreviation for Frequency in Log F-Contrast.
No Perfect Lens, No Perfect Lens Test
Roger Cicala of LensRentals.com has completed the second part of his two part series investigating lens testing.
In the first part: “There is No Perfect Lens“, Roger explored about the sharpness variability that is inherent to consumer-grade lenses:
“My first thought when seeing more variation than expected was our testing methods weren’t accurate. So we refined testing methods, eliminated bad copies, and tested only new copies. The variation was still there.
“Like most people testing lenses, we used Imatest. But maybe a lens-test projector would be better. Nope. Well, the gold standard was MTF measured on an optical bench. So we (despite the vigorous protestations of those-who-manage-the-money) bought an optical bench. It showed a similar amount of copy-to-copy variation.”
In the second part: “There is No Perfect Lens Test, Either”, Roger compares testing using Imatest to the expensive optical bench. He makes some valid constructive criticisms about how a variation in SFRplus region selection can lead to different reviewers having a variation in their test results. Roger also writes about how chart quality can be the limiting factor for measurements, and the importance of testing multiple focus distances. (more…)
Imatest October 2013 Newsletter
Imatest 3.10 Released
The latest version of Imatest has been optimized for speed and includes many improvements and new features. A new image stabilization module allows users to test the efficacy of a camera’s optical image stabilization (OIS). To see a rundown of all of the new additions to version 3.10, take a look at our blog detailing the release. (more…)
Imatest 3.10 Released
The release of version 3.10 of Imatest brings a host of improvements to make image quality testing faster and more relevant to advances in cameras. Look for performance, stability, interface and measurement improvements across the board as well as some excellent new modules and features.
New Features:
- An Optical Image Stabilization (OIS) module has been added to measure OIS effectiveness using images of the SFRplus chart. This module compares three images: unshaken, shaken without OIS, and shaken with OIS. It can also be used to compare SFRplus images from different imaging systems.
- The new Multitest module can analyze all of the color and grayscale charts supported by the interactive Multicharts module in a non-interactive mode that allows batch runs. (Multitest was called ColorTest in early 3.10 releases.)
- Five existing Rescharts modules─ Random (which supports the new “Spilled Coins” texture chart), Log F–Contrast, Wedge, Star (Siemens), and Any Image Sharpness ─ are now available as non-interactive modules that can be run in batches.
- New hue and saturation displays have been added to the Multicharts color accuracy, tonal response and noise modules.
- The new Random/Dead Leaves module provides stronger support for Dead Leaves-type texture charts, particularly for the new Imatest Spilled Coins chart, which is more uniform and has better scale-invariance resulting in more consistent measurements for different image sizes.
Transmissive Chart Quality Comparison
Imatest currently sells several transmissive (backlit) test charts, which have a range of substrates, each with specific properties and qualities that are in process of being quantified. The following comparison of the most important of our transmissive substrates was prepared in response to several customer inquiries.