Computer-aided speckle interferometry using spectral amplitude fringes.

A fully automatic speckle metrology technique is developed. Two speckle patterns of a specimen, one before and one after the specimen deformation, are captured by a video camera. An equivalent double-exposure speckle pattern is obtained by superimposing the two digital images. The superimposed speckle pattern is then segmented into a series of small subimages. For each subimage a fast-Fourier transform is applied and a computer-generated Young's fringe pattern is obtained. The fringe pattern, which characterizes the local displacement vector, is analyzed by a second fast-Fourier transform. The local displacement vector is determined by a cardinal interpolation and a crest searching around a signal peak in the second spectral domain. An artificial rigid shift between the two images is introduced in the cases of extremely large or small displacements. From analysis of all subimage pairs of the whole superimposed speckle pattern a complete two-dimensional displacement field is deduced. Experimental results using laser as well as white-light speckle patterns are demonstrated.