The Single-Camera Approach to Addressing Inspection Challenges in the Pharmaceutical and Beverage Industries

In syringe needle manufacturing, inspection is required to identify incorrect cap placement or, bent needles, or to check for the presence of cutters, levers, or shields. When examining vaccine vials and stoppers, care must be taken to inspect for the presence of dents, cap scratches, and deformation, or to read matrix codes, bar codes, or expiration dates. Similarly, in beverage inspection, manufacturers seek to perform accurate measurements of plastic bottles and preforms, requiring precise measurement of neck dimensions, body diameter, threat measurement, and base thickness. Because inspection takes place on features that are randomly located both on the inner and outer sides, along with the top and bottom surfaces, the most common approach is to use multiple cameras to account for all views. However, multiple camera setups are often too bulky to fit within demanding space constraints on the line, and depth- of- field issues arise when imaging at high magnification. Also, in multi-camera systems, many images need to be processed, which might take long elaboration times when dealing with high-end applications. Mondadori covers technological innovations that allow for a single camera to perform complex feature inspection tasks.

About the presenter
Francesco Mondadori obtained a master’s degree in materials and production engineering at the University of Trento while already working in an internship at Opto Engineering. He is the company’s product manager and business developer for optics and cameras.