Vision solutions: understanding 3D technology

3D vision systems are widely used in industrial automation and robotics, supporting applications such as vision guided robotics, material handling, logistics, AMRs and UAVs. They also play important roles in smart city and intelligent traffic systems. All such applications rely on accurate depth information to improve precision, efficiency, and reliability. So let's look at the key 3D vision technologies.

Parallel structured light: This technology projects a defined light pattern onto an object and uses a camera to analyse distortions in that pattern to calculate depth. It is well suited to high-quality 3D scanning where the requirement is to capture detailed surfaces and shapes. A key advantage of this technology is its strong performance on challenging surfaces, including transparent or reflective materials (as demonstrated by advanced motion-based systems).

Stereo vision: This uses two cameras to capture images from different angles, calculating depth via triangulation. It meets the needs of general-purpose 3D imaging, as well as robotic guidance and inspection applications. It is cost-effective and versatile, but performance can be lower in scenes with little visual texture.

Laser profilers: These use a laser line projected onto an object, with cameras capturing the deformation of that line to build precise 3D profiles. They are best suited for high-precision measurement tasks and detailed surface profiling, providing very high accuracy, and being capable of producing dense 3D data such as profiles, depth maps or point clouds.

Time-of-flight sensors: These measure the time it takes for emitted light (typically infrared) to reflect back from an object, calculating distance based on this timing. The technology is ideally suited to fast, real-time 3D sensing, particularly over larger working distances and in dynamic environments. They are robust and efficient for industrial applications, but offer lower fine-detail resolution compared to other technologies.

OEM Automatic represents a number of leading brands for 3D vision technologies, including Sony, Photoneo, Basler, Zebra and Ouster. It also provides the edge computing technologies to deploy 3D vision applications everything you need from a single source.