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- When all three lights are lit, X-rays are on!
Figure 4- Tri-color tower light mounted on the lead shielded x-ray box. This light acts as a visual indicator of the x-ray source status
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Figure 6- Active area monitor display (left), high level alarm warning light and port side scintillator (middle), starboard scintillator (right).
Emergency Stop Switch
An emergency stop switch is located over the starboard side shielding (Figure 7). When activated, this switch will interrupt the power to the source and stop the source from generating x-rays as part of the fail safe circuit.
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With continuous running, the CP160 can overheat. The CP160 will shut itself down when the internal tank temperature reaches 55°C. The IMS software continuously monitors the CP160 temperature and displays on the main acquisition screen. If the x-ray source temperature exceeds 45°C the x-rays are shut off and the Cool Down Wait… window (Figure 8) is displayed until the temperature drops below 35°C. Once reaching 35°C the X-ray Start command will be given and acquisition will resume. The user may abort at any time by clicking the ABORT button.
Figure 8- Cool Down Wait window. This window will appear if the IMS software detects an x-ray source temperature of 45 degrees C or higher.
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Launching the IMS X-ray Imager application
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The IMS XMSL software can be launched from the Windows Start menu or from the desktop icon (Figure 9).
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Figure 10- XMSL IMS Main Window
A Quick Introduction to the IMS Program Structure
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The four buttons on the IMS-UI window provide access to utilities/editors via dropdown menus as shown in Figure 11.
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Figure 11- IMS Control Panel Drop down Menus
Initial Instrument Setup
XMSL Configuration
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Figure 13- Position of detector center from the track's home switch
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XMSL DAQ Parameters
Prior to collecting x-radiographs on whole rounds or section halves in the XMSL, the user must set the imaging parameters (voltage, exposure, current). For explanation on how to test exposure parameters prior to imaging, see the Image Utility section. For explanation on how to test image processing parameters, see the Image Process Utility section.
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Each of the stacked images is taken with the exposure time, kV, and mA set in this window. To estimate the length of time it takes for each image at specific settings, multiply the exposure time by the number of stacked images.
Figure 14- XMSL Measurement Editor Window
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Starting Measurements
Prior to imaging cores, especially at the start of an expedition, the user must:
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Figure 16- X-ray Status Window (left). As the source ramps up, the measured values will update. X-ray system not ready window (right). If the source is not ready to ramp up this window will be displayed. Normally, this indicates that a door is open. If the doors are not open, look at the values in the status displays and refer to the vendor’s manual to determine the issue. As soon as the issue is cleared, this window will close and the x-ray start process will resume.
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Figure 17- IMS Display During Imaging. Main features of this window include: Abort button, raw image display, imaging parameters display, X-ray source temperature graph, histogram of pixel value and displays of the pixel values along the length and width of the image.
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6. The Sample ID information window will reappear on the screen (Figure 18).
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When the imaging is complete, IMS will automatically process the raw images and output them to the AUX_DATA folder. These are not the primary processed images, but are available for quick image evaluation. For more information on IMS image processing, see the Automatic Image Processing section.
X-Rays OFF
Figure 19 will be displayed when the X-ray Off command is sent to the CP120. The window will be displayed until the kV has been confirmed to be at zero.
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Figure 19- X-ray Off Status Window
NOTE: During imaging, the user can use the software abort button to end the imaging process and ramp down the source. The abort button is available when the x-ray source is ramping up and during the imaging process.
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Stop and Do Nothing: Actuator will remain in place. Use this option if the section had jammed in the XMSL or is there is a hardware issue.
Figure 20- Dialog when after user selects abort during imaging. The x-ray source will automatically ramp down once abort is selected. The section in the imager will need to be restarted from the beginning once abort is selected.
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Detector Calibration
Detector calibration should be done at the beginning of the expedition and whenever the exposure settings are changed significantly (integration time especially). If the detector grid becomes visible in any images, calibrate the detector and reimage the core.
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Figure 23-Dark Image Acquisition Window
White Image Calibration
The WHITE image is used for the gain correction after the offset correction with the dark image is completed.
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- During and after acquisition of a new DARK image, the DARK image display will be black. But when the utility first opens and displays the previous image, it appears brighter. We have confirmed that the data in the image has not been altered from its initial acquisition and have no explanation as to why the display has been lightened.
- Never alter the DARK and WHITE image with other programs.
- The grid pattern is not fully eliminated from the image but is suppressed by the DARK image subtraction. Under certain conditions and processing parameters it may still be detected in the images.
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Image Utility
The image utility can be found under Instruments > Camera: Image Utility (Figure 11). This utility is useful for determining the proper voltage, current, and integration (exposure) time for imaging cores. User can also review the processed images in this utility.
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Figure 30- General Image Utility User Interface Window. This utility is used test exposure settings before imaging a section. The histogram (upper left) will be displayed when the ROI box tool is used and the line profile (lower left) is displayed when the ROI line tool is used.
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Image Processing
The raw .tif IMS images are automatically saved during image collection. IODP provides two methods for processing the raw images.
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Figure 33- Example of ROI tool used on a raw image and the resulting intensity profile.
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Getting An Image
Before you can begin experimenting with the settings, you need to open an existing image or acquire a new image. If you are opening an existing image make sure that it is a “raw” image. If you are acquiring an image make sure that the FPD calibration has been done and the exposure parameters set appropriately. Click either the Open Raw Image or the Acquire Image button.
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Where MaxPX and MinPx determined from the entire image ignoring values equal to 65534 (oversaturated pixels) and n is the user set percentage.
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Figure 34- Example image before the mask is applied (left) and after (right)
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The best way to understand the image smoothing process is to look at the pixel intensity profile across the core (Figure 36). The black line is the profile of the original image. The variation due to the core thickness is greater than the variation due to internal sedimentary structure/particles. The red line is the same profile after smoothing.
Figure 36- Pixel intensity profile across the core (black line). Note that the variation due to core thickness is larger than the variation due to sedimentary structure. The red line is the smoothed profile.
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- Savitzky-Golay FIR smoothing:
- o Side-point divider: The length of the row or column is divided by this value to determine the length of the side points used by the smoothing operation. A large value means shorter side point length. Note, using values below 3 for the Z axis will significantly increase the processing time!
- o Polynomial: Determines how close the smooth curve fits the original data. For the X-axis this should be set high to conform to the whole or half-round attenuation pattern. Low values will cause “ripples’ on the side edges. For APC cores, the Z-axis value should be set near two. For rotary cores, the Z-axis value should be set closer to seven. The value will depends on how disturbed the core is and experimentation is needed to get good results.
- Median Filter: Rank is the length of values used in the filter operations. Small rank values are more responsive to shape changes but will cause fine details to disappear.
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3. The resulting array is then processed by row using the values set for the X-axis settings. This results in an array of “smoothed” values.
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5. The resulting 2D array is cast back to U16 image (Unsigned 16 bit format), referred to as the difference image.
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Trim to Black
This effects how the smoothing operators (above) are applied. If this value is set false, then the above process is applied to the entire mask image including the mask. If it is set to true, then the mask is not processed. This is important for rotary cores where the edges are irregular and core gaps are common.
Image Contrast Expansion:
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Figure 39- Image Contrast Expansion example. The top image is the difference image prior to the expansion. Note the overall grey raw image. In the lower image, the contrast range has been expanded. The sedimentary structures are now visible within the image.
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With the expanded histogram the same cross-core profile shown in Figure 38 will now look like Figure 40. Example images of the processing steps are shown in Figure 41.
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- The axis of the source’s x-ray beam must centered on the detector and perpendicular to its surface.
- The pixel to centimeter scaling factor must be determined. As of X379 this value was determined to be 109.6px/cm when measured at the half-core height. A grid standard is available for use to repeat the measurement
- In IMS, you must set the instrument offset to the center row of pixels of the detector.
Manual Image Processing
The raw .tif IMS images are automatically saved during image collection. IODP provides two methods for processing the raw images.
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Figure 44- IODP processing X-ray Imager software command window
2. Open an internet browser window and enter/copy the local host address, http://localhost:8080/, from the X-ray imager command window
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Figure 45- IODP X-ray imager processing window
3. Select the Processing Settings link under the Navigation heading. This step is only necessary when first configuring the program or when changing file types.
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Figure 48- Thickness Compensation and Scale Bar Settings Default values
Figure 49- Minimum Core Thickness Compensation Example images. The compensation values for these images are 0.5 cm (left) and 5 cm (right). Notice the narrowed corrected image on the right.
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Figure 50- Image Histogram from x-ray image processing software
14. Adjust the settings under the Process Images header to match with the image setup (Figure 51).
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Figure 51- X-ray image processing screen. Adjust the core settings and folder name before processing images
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Figure 52- Core diameter adjustment example images. This section of core contained full liner with narrowed sediments in between. The left and middle image were processed with the entire section, whereas the image on the right was processed individually. The diameter of the core is set at 7.0 cm in the left image and is set to 6.0 cm in the middle image and right image. Note that in the individually processed image, some smaller clasts are visible.
15. Under the File Name header:
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b. Optional: Enter a string to append to the end of each processed file
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16. Select Process Files under the Process header.
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Figure 53- Example of manual processing when the core diameter is set too narrow.
2. No images appear after selecting Process Images: The bit size or pixel length are not set correctly. Check the command window for error messages and check the settings in the processing settings window.
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File Formats and File Uploading
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Raw file location (whole rounds): C:\Data\In\SECT\Site\Hole\Core\Section
Processed file name:
379-U1533A-1H-1_0-140_SECT9762671_20190225104523_k110_a1_t3_n20_RAW_processed.tif
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Processed file location (whole rounds): C:\Aux_Data\Flat Images\SECT\Site\Hole\Core\Section
Calibration Images (Dark and Light): C:\IMS-10\CONFIG_XMSL\XIMG CALB
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A unique time stamp is appended to each image.
Motion Control Setup:
Motion control should be set during initial setup and further changes should not be necessary. Motion control setup can be accessed by selecting Motion > Setup from the IMS panel menu (Figure 11). The M-Drive Motion Setup control panel will open (Figure 54).
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Click Accept to save the values or Cancel to return to previous values.
Figure 55 - XMSL Motor and Track Options Setup Window
Figure 56- Motion Utility Window
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Figure 57 - XMSL Fixed Positions Window
Limit and Home Switches Window
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To use the GOSCAN Flat Panel Detector with IMS it is necessary to make the following hardware configuration in the Window’s Device Manger and in NIMAX.
Device Manager
- Login as administrator
- In the window, select the Intel 1350 Gigabit Network Connection (that is the NIC that the GOSCAN is connected to) (Figure 60).
- Right click and select properties.
- Click advance tab
- Select Jumbo Packet and set value to 9014 Bytes.
- Click OK
Figure 60- Device Manager window and jumbo packet setup
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NI MAX Configuration:
- Open NIMAX
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Programmer’s Note: the value “1727014677” is the alias name used by the LabVIEW code:
NIMAX summary
Most values shown are the default values. Those highlight are critical to the IMS acquisition.
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Total Physical Memory | 31.8 GB |
Free Physical Memory | 26.2 GB |
Total Virtual Memory | 36.5 GB |
Free Virtual Memory | 30.7 GB |
Primary Disk Capacity | 476 GB |
Primary Disk Free Space | 130 GB |
CPU Model | Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-6700 CPU @ 3.40GHz |
Teledyne DALSA GoScan 1510 HR "1727014677" |
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Name | 1727014677 |
Hostname | 169.254.5.141 |
Vendor | Teledyne DALSA |
Model | Teledyne DALSA GoScan 1510 HR |
Serial Number | DC60A1378609 |
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Attribute Categories
Attribute Tables
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| Issue | Solution |
|---|---|
An error message occurs when the user opens the software indicating an invalid calibration for the dark and white images, but the dark and white images are available on the computer.
| Verify that the .ini files are referring to valid calibration images that exist in the correct locations. If the files exist, then check the USB connections to the computer, particularly the USB for the X-ray source. |
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