Inspecting product quality with computer vision techniques : Comparing traditional image processingmethodswith deep learning methodson small datasets in finding surface defects

Abstract: Quality control is an important part of any production line. It can be done manually but is most efficient if automated. Inspecting qualitycan include many different processes but this thesisisfocusedon the visual inspection for cracks and scratches. The best way of doingthis at the time of writing is with the help of Artificial Intelligence (AI), more specifically Deep Learning (DL).However, these need a training datasetbeforehand to train on and for some smaller companies, this mightnotbean option. This study triesto find an alternative visual inspection method,that does notrelyon atrained deep learning modelfor when trainingdata is severely limited. Our method is to use edge detection algorithmsin combination with a template to find any edge that doesn’t belong. These include scratches, cracks, or misaligned stickers. These anomalies arethen highlighted in the original picture to show where the defect is. Since deep learningis stateof the art ofvisual inspection, it is expected to outperform template matching when sufficiently trained.To find where this occurs,the accuracy of template matching iscompared to the accuracy of adeep learning modelat different training levels. The deep learning modelisto be trained onimage augmenteddatasets of size: 6, 12, 24, 48, 84, 126, 180, 210, 315, and 423. Both template matching and the deep learning modelwas tested on the samebalanceddataset of size 216. Half of the dataset was images of scratched units,and the other half was of unscratched units. This gave a baseline of 50% where anything under would be worse thanjust guessing. Template matching achieved an accuracy of 88%, and the deep learning modelaccuracyrose from 51% to 100%as the training setincreased. This makes template matching have better accuracy then AI trained on dataset of 84imagesor smaller. But a deep learning modeltrained on 126 images doesstart to outperform template matching. Template matching did perform well where no data was available and training adeep learning modelis no option. But unlike a deep learning model, template matching would not need retraining to find other kinds of surface defects. Template matching could also be used to find for example, misplaced stickers. Due to the use of a template, any edge that doesnot match isdetected.  The ways to train deep learning modelis highly customizable to the users need. Due to resourceand knowledge restrictions, a deep dive into this subject was not conducted.For template matching, only Canny edge detection was used whenmeasuringaccuracy. Other edge detection methodssuch as, Sobel, and Prewitt was ruledoutearlier in this study.