The use of lenses is one of the most important elements that enable machine vision to be an integral part of many industries today. A machine vision lens captures highly accurate, clear, and detailed images of objects for use in inspection and automation processes. Unlike regular camera lenses, machine vision lenses are designed specifically for high-speed production situations where there are varying illumination levels and a need for accurate focusing with very tight tolerances. Using a machine vision lens will give you sharp, consistent images for tasks such as checking small parts, reading bar codes, or inspecting the quality of a package.
A Telecentric lens is a type of Machine Vision Lens and is often regarded as the most useful and progressive lens in the Machine Vision industry. The main difference between telecentric lenses and conventional machine vision lenses is the absence of perspective distortion. The result of this is that no matter how distant or close the object is from the lens, it will appear to have the same size. Because of this property, telecentric lenses are very important in those fields of industry where there are requirements for measurement to be of an absolutely precise nature (e.g. Electronic Industry, Medical Device Industry, Precision Engineering, etc.), and they are relied upon to help machines to make proper decisions based upon the image produced with perfect dimensional precision.
The Telecentric Imaging Lens is also unique in that it provides the ability to have consistent brightness across the entire image produced. This is important as an image that has been illuminated unevenly will cause inaccuracies during an inspection. Imaging done through the use of the Telecentric lens will produce images with high quality edges (i.e. they will be sharp) and true shapes, while capturing all details correctly. Examples of applications of telecentric imaging lenses to produce images would include: Quality Control/Quality Assurance, Component Measurement, Defect Detection, etc.
The development of machine vision technologies is continuing to increase, and implementing the correct lens for your machine vision application will greatly enhance the functionality of any automation system. The selection of a lens will ultimately depend on your intended use of the lens within your overall automation application. A simple machine vision lens would be suitable for general inspection of materials, barcode reading, Object tracking, etc. However, if your application involves any type of precise measurement, shape recognition enhanced/high precision applications, then a Machine Vision Telecentric lens would best fit your needs.
A simple machine vision lens allows for machine vision systems to “see” as an human would. Telecentric machine vision lenses provide additional capabilities by providing distortion-free images, resulting in actual-to-scale imaging.
As industry continues to move towards more intelligent automation, investing in quality machine vision Telecentric lenses will improve productivity, achieve greater levels of accuracy, and result in overall enhanced performance. Machine Vision lenses, Machine Vision Telecentric lenses, Telecentric Imaging lenses; all quality optics are the foundation of reliable, high-quality results.