Real-time visualisation of deformation fields using speckle interferometry and temporal phase unwrapping

A real-time system for analysing data from speckle interferometers, and speckle shearing interferometers, has been developed. Interferograms are continuously recorded by a digital camera at a rate of 60 frames s⁻¹ with temporal phase shifting carried out at the same rate. The images are analysed using a pipeline image processor. With a standard 4-frame phase-shifting algorithm (phase steps of π/2), wrapped phase maps are calculated and displayed at 15 frames s⁻¹. These are unwrapped using a temporal phase unwrapping algorithm to provide a real-time colour-coded display of the relevant displacement component. Each camera pixel (or cluster of pixels) behaves in effect as an independent displacement sensor. The reference speckle interferogram is updated automatically at regular user-defined intervals, allowing arbitrarily large deformations to be measured and errors due to speckle decorrelation to be minimised. The system has been applied to the problem of detecting sub-surface delamination cracks in carbon fibre composite panels.