Image analysis

Image analysis

The distribution of impurities

in pulp and paper: the effects
of the random distribution
of impurities on image analysis
Christian Zeyer, Richard A. Venditti, Ku W. Puangchinda, and John A. Heitmann

ined is 10 m2 or 5 m2 on each side of

ABSTRACT: The random distribution of impurities in pulp the paper. An estimation of dirt in
and paper has significant implications for image analysis. An one shipment is then expected to
vary within 20% for different observ-
equation based on statistical considerations to predict the ers.
distribution of impurities in pulp and paper has been derived to Todays sophisticated computer
relate the relative error of measured impurities in ppm with the assisted image analysis systems have
opened a new dimension for the esti-
area analyzed, the average particle size, and the level of mation of the amount of impurities
impurities in ppm. The prediction of the error agrees well with in pulp and paper. Many research-
image analysis results of handsheets with impurity levels from ers have developed systems to cal-
culate automatically the area covered
10 to 1000 ppm. The predictions of the equation also agree with impurities and have estimated
with the image analysis results on a commercial grade of recycled the error between the real amount
copy paper. The errors due to the limits of reproducibility of the and the measured amount (1-5). The
reported results show a stunning re-
image analysis system are small compared to errors due to the producibility, when compared with
random distribution of impurities. the methods based on human vision.
With respect to this, the question
KEYWORDS: Errors, experimentation, image analysis, impu- has to be asked if it is still necessary
rities, random processes, statistical distribution, theories. to examine areas as large as recom-
mended by T 437 or T 213. Many
researchers have therefore decided
to use smaller areas. Dexter (4) con-
T he examination of pulp and pa-
per with respect to its optical
properties has a past that goes far
how to quantify the total area cov-
ered (measured in ppm) by impuri-
ties in pulp and paper. Both methods
cluded from his work that 20
handsheets are enough to examine
pulp that has a concentration of im-
beyond todays computer image talk in respective sections about the
purities of less than 10 ppm. How-
analysis. TAPPI Test Methods T 213 sample size, i.e., the area to be ana-
ever, he does not give any indication
om-89 (Dirt in Pulp) and T 437 lyzed, and the error that is to be
on how he justifies his statement.
om-90 (Dirt in Paper and Paper- expected. When, for example, the
Similar to our findings in a previous
board) date back to the 1930s and amount of dirt in paper is estimated,
paper (5), Sutman comments in his
explain in detail the procedure of the total area that should be exam-
paper (6) that the error resulting
from the imaging process (measure-
Zeyer is research scientist, Venditti is assistant professor, Puangchinda is graduate ment error) can be neglected, com-
student, and Heitmann is associate professor, Dept. of Wood and Paper Science, pared to the error that results from
North Carolina State University, Box 8005, Raleigh, NC 27695-8005.
the differences between the dirt con-
168 February 1995 Tappi Journal
 1. Detected area covered by spots for handsheets with target ppm values of 100 and 1000 vs
the gray scale value threshold. A constant threshold of 155 (indicated by arrows) was used
for all samples in this study.
1,000,000
100,000
AREA OF SPOTS, ppm
10,000
1,000
100
10
1 1). It is therefore very difficult, even
50
I. Correlation between felt and wire side of
the same handsheet
Target, ppm
1000
600
200
100
30
10
tent of two handsheets of the same
pulp batch (sampling error). Since
the sampling error can be reduced
by scanning a larger area, the ques-
tion that has to be investigated is
how large the scanned area must be
in order to achieve an expected error
of an acceptable magnitude.
TAPPI testing methods suggest
an area to be scanned of 10 m2, which
is beyond most practical means.
Therefore, it seems worthwhile to
examine this question more thor-
oughly. It is the goal of this publica-
tion to develop an estimation of the
Vol. 78, No. 2 Tappi Journal
1000 ppm Handsheet
100 ppm Handsheet
100 150 200 250
GRAY SCALE VALUE THRESHOLD
error of the measured area covered
by impurities based on theoretical
considerations. The predictions will
be evaluated by comparison with real
experimental data. By validating the
Correlation predictions of the theory, we intend
-0.87114 to provide simple guidelines that will
-0.39012 help estimate the scanned area nec-
-0.33009 essary to achieve a targeted preci-
0.543076 sion. This publication focuses on the
0.126023 theory and validation of the method
-0.20117 developed to predict the error in the
measurement of area covered by im-
purities. In a companion article,
which follows this article in this jour-
nal, simple, practical guidelines are
presented which can be used to esti-
mate the amount of scanned area
needed to provide a desired relative
error for area covered by impurities
(7).
Error in image analysis
The error in image analysis can be
considered to stem from three dif-
ferent sources. The first part of the
error is due to inexact measurement
of the imaging device. This error can
be estimated by repeated analysis of
the same sample. Research has
169
shown that this error is compara-
tively small (5, 6). The relative error
(meaning the standard deviation of
the measurements relative to the av-
erage of these measurements, also
called the coefficient of variation),
however, seems to increase with a
decrease in total area covered by
impurities (5).
The second part of the error, the
systematic error, is due to the set-
tings chosen by the operator (8). In
fact, Heintze (9) demonstrated that
the differences between different
methods can be as much as a factor
of 20. Even when the same equip-
ment is used, the machine settings,
especially the threshold, have a tre-
mendous effect on the result (Fig.
impossible, to compare different ma-
chines, even different settings on the
same machine. This certainly calls
for a standardization as outlined in
(10). However, if different samples
are compared using the same set-
tings, this problem can be avoided.
The third part of the error in im-
age analysis stems from the sam-
pling procedure. It is this part of the
error we intend to evaluate in par-
ticular. It is our belief that this error
is underestimated, especially in the
mill environment. As Riempp et al.
(11) explain, it is the statistics of ran-
dom sampling that determines the
amount of impurities in a handsheet
made from a given pulp sample. Since
the impurities are randomly, not
evenly, distributed in the total sample
and we use only a fraction of the
material to produce a handsheet, the
levels of impurities will differ slightly
for different handsheets. Therefore,
the more handsheets that are used
for an analysis, the smaller the confi-
dence interval (meaning, for example,
the region in which it can be confi-
dently stated that 95% of all values
will lie) will be. In this paper, it will
be demonstrated that this is one of
the main reasons why TAPPI T 437
suggests that an area of 10 m2 should
be analyzed. If this is true, then there
is not much reason to reduce the
amount of pulp or paper analyzed
 Image analysis
2. Actual ppm vs target ppm of handsheets. Note that the absolute
scatter of data is larger at higher values of ppm. No significant
difference can be observed in the wire side and felt side data.
3. Number of spots detected vs target ppm of handsheets. Note that
the absolute scatter of data is larger at higher values of ppm. No
significant difference can be observed in the wire side and felt side
data.

1400 200

NUMBER OF SPOTS DETECTED

1200 Wire side Wire side
Felt side Felt side
150
1000
ACTUAL ppm

800
100
600

400
50

200

0 0
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200 1400 0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200

TARGET ppm TARGET ppm

4. Ratio of handsheet ppm to target ppm vs target ppm. Note that
the scatter of data decreases with increasing ppm (whereas the
absolute scatter of actual ppm increases with increasing ppm, Fig.
2). No significant difference can be observed in the wire side and felt
side data.
5. Wire side ppm minus felt side ppm vs target ppm. Data randomly
above and below the y-axis demonstrate that no significant differ-
ence in ppm existed in this study between the two sides of the
handsheet.

6 500
WIRESIDE ppm FELT SIDE ppm
HANDSHEET ppm / TARGET ppm

Wire side
5
Felt side

3 0

0 500
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200 1400 0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200 1400

TARGET ppm TARGET ppm

just because an automatic and seem- Statistics of a where Ai is the area of a single spot.
ingly more precise method is used. random distribution Since the average area of a spot, AM,
Moreover, theoretical considerations is calculated by:
in this work will allow an estimate of
of impurities in pulp
AM = (1/N) x Ai (2)
the variability of the evaluated The total area covered by impuri-
samples beforehand, when appropri- ties, AT, can be calculated by: with N being the number of spots,
ate estimations of the pulp quality the expected value of the total area
AT = Ai (1) covered by impurities, E(AT), can be
are available.
expressed by:
170 February 1995 Tappi Journal
 6. Variance of the number of spots vs number of spots. The data are
scattered about the 45 line, as expected for a random distribution
of impurities in pulp. For random distributions, 80% and 50% of the
data are expected to fall within the respective limits plotted on the
graph.
7. Predicted error vs actual error. The predicted error was calcu-
lated using Eq. 8. The actual error is the standard deviation of the
experimentally detected ppm of handsheet sides of a target ppm
batch. Results for the wire side and felt side are similar. The scatter
of data about the 45 line provides validation of Eq. 8.

400 200
VARIANCE OF NUMBER OF SPOTS

350 Wire side Wire side

PREDICTED ERROR, ppm

Felt side Felt side
300 45 Line 150
80% Limit
250 50% Limit

200 100

150

100 50

50

0 0
0 50 100 150 200 250 0 50 100 150 200

NUMBER OF SPOTS ACTUAL ERROR, ppm

E(AT) = E(AM) x E(N)
The variance (equal to the square of
the standard deviation) of AT can
then be written as:
Var(AT) = Var(N x AM)
It can be shown that the variance of
a function h(X,Y) of two indepen-
dent stochastically distributed vari-
ables, X (estimated from n mea-
surements) and Y (estimated from
m measurements), can be written as
(12):
Var(h(X,Y)) = [1/(nm 1)] x [(n 1) x m x
(h/X)2 x Var(X) + (m 1) x n x ( h/Y)2
x Var(Y)] (5)
Since our system from which we
sample contains mostly water, less
than 1% pulp and an even smaller
amount of impurities, the assump-
tion of independence is justified as
long as vigorous agitation is assured.
It can be shown that the variance
of the count of randomly distributed
features is equal to the number of
the features (13). Using this and Eq.
5, Eq. 4 can be rewritten to yield:
Var(AT) = [1/(N + 1)][N2 x AM2 + N3 x
Var(AM)] (6)
(3) because n = m = N, the number of
spots on a sample. Using the vari-
ance of the area covered by single
spots, Var(Ai) = (Ai AM)2/(N 1)
obtainable from an automated dirt
(4) count, Eq. 6 yields:
Var(AT) = [N2/(N + 1)][AM2 + Var(Ai)] (7)
Equivalently:
SDEV(AT) = {(N2/(N + 1))
[ AM2 + Var(AI)]}0.5
where SDEV is the standard devia-
tion, and SDEV(AT) = [VAR(AT)]0.5.
By factoring out an AMN from the
right hand side of Eq. 8 and rear-
ranging, the relative error of the to-
tal area covered by impurities,
SDEV%(AT), can then be determined
as:
SDEV%(AT) = [SDEV(AT)/AT] x 100% =
100% x [(1 + Var(AI)/AM2)/(N + 1)]0.5 (9)
Equation 9 is useful because it al-
lows an immediate measure of the
dispersion of the measurement,
SDEV(AT) relative to the measure-
ment value AT. For each handsheet,
one can calculate an estimation of
the error in AT due to the random
distribution of impurities using Eq.
7 or 8. For this, the number of spots,
the average spot size and the vari-
ance of the spot size have to be de-
termined.
This error can then be compared
to the standard deviation of AT ob-
tained from the measurement of a
series of handsheets made from the
same batch. By repeatedly scanning
the same handsheet, one can also
(8) gain an estimation of the error in the
measurement of AT introduced by
the imaging device. The three er-
rors can then be contrasted to each
other. If Eq. 3 and Eq. 9 are com-
bined, one can gain an equation that
estimates the relative error in the
measurement of AT as a function of
the level of impurities in ppm (parts
per million):
SDEV%(AT) = 100% x {[1 +Var(Ai)/AM2]/
[(ppm x AS/(106 x AM)) + 1]}0.5 (10)
where AS is the total scanned area.
The only difference between Eq. 9
and Eq. 10 is that N in Eq. 9 is
substituted by ppm x AS/106 x AM in
Eq. 10. To use Eq. 10, the values of
Var(Ai) and AM must be known or
estimated. This equation can be di-
rectly used to estimate the error of

Vol. 78, No. 2 Tappi Journal 171

 Image analysis
8. Actual error and scanning error vs actual handsheet ppm. The
scanning error is determined by comparing two scans of the same
side of the same handsheet and is an indication of the reproducibil-
ity of the image analysis system. The actual error is the standard
deviation of the experimentally detected ppm of the wire or felt sides
of a target ppm batch. Note that the actual error is greater than the
scanning error at all values of ppm.
200
Scanning error wire
160 Scanning error felt
Actual error wire
Actual error felt
ERROR, ppm
120
80
40
0 0
0 200 400 600
ACTUAL HANDSHEET, ppm
an analysis given the population pa-
rameters of the spots, the level of
impurities and the total scanned
area.
Experimental
Handsheet preparation
Six batches of handsheets were made
with target impurities of 10, 20, 100,
200, 600, and 1000 ppm. The paper
used was a typical office xerographic
paper, Matrix Xerographic D. P. Hi-
Speed, 75 g/m 2, distributed by
Zellerbach, A Mead Co. The paper
was printed with a standard image
using Xerox 5100 copier with Xerox
Dry Ink 5100 toner.
Each batch of handsheets was pre-
pared as follows. A total of 60 oven-
dry grams of paper, with a ratio of
blank sheets to printed sheets that
would approximately provide the tar-
get ppm, was mixed with tap water
to achieve a 1.5% consistency. No
deinking chemicals were used. The
mixture was disintegrated using a
TAPPI Disintegrator. From this
batch, ten 100-mL specimens were
removed and made into handsheets
using standard TAPPI procedures;
172 February 1995 Tappi Journal
9. Relative error vs actual ppm. The actual relative error was
determined experimentally as the standard deviation divided by the
average ppm (in percent) of a target ppm batch. The prediction of
Eq. 10 is also plotted on the graph. The agreement between the
prediction of Eq. 10 and the data provides validation of Eq. 10.
200
Actual rel. error: wire side
160 Actual rel. error: felt side
RELATIVE ERROR, %
Eq. 10: Var(Ai)/AM2 = 0.0
Eq. 10: Var(Ai)/AM2 = 1.5
120 Eq. 10: Var(Ai)/AM2 = 5.0
80
40
800 1000 0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200
ACTUAL HANDSHEET, ppm
the resulting ten handsheets were size of the spots, and a histogram of
each approximately 1.5 g. The batch spot size versus frequency. The
was kept well mixed during sam- smallest size spot that could be dis-
pling. The handsheets were stored tinguished under the conditions was
at ambient conditions before image 0.007 mm2 (one square pixel, with
analysis. edge 85 microns).
Each batch of 10 handsheets was
Image analysis of handsheets analyzed using the following proce-
dure. Random numbers between 1
Images of the resulting handsheets
and 40 were generated; two of these
were acquired using a flatbed scan-
random numbers were assigned to
ner (HP Scan Jet Plus, Model HP
each side of each handsheet. The
9195A/AB) at 300 dots per inch
handsheet sides were then scanned
(about 85 micron dot width) optical
in ascending order of their assigned
resolution. The scanner was run
number, 1 through 40. This proce-
through a warmup procedure before
dure was performed to remove any
use as suggested in our previous pa-
auto correlation between successive
per (5). The scanner produced a gray
scans on a single handsheet. It al-
scale image data file of the handsheet
lowed for a randomized estimate of
in which each image element, a pixel,
the error of the scanning.
could have a gray scale value (GSV)
The scanned area was a 3 by 3-in.
between 0 = dark and 255 = white.
square approximately centered in
The image analysis was performed
the circular handsheet. To ensure a
using a DOS-based, file-oriented im-
repeated scan of the same area on
age analysis program, Imagine, de-
the handsheet, the handsheets were
veloped at the Dept. of Wood and
cut slightly larger than the scanned
Paper Science, North Carolina State
area and placed on the same posi-
University. A GSV threshold of 155
tion of the flatbed scanner. The cut-
was utilized to distinguish the con-
ting of the samples also made the
taminants (GSV < 155) from the
samples lie flat on the scanner, a
background (GSV 155). The image
procedure which decreases the mea-
analysis software provided the num-
surement error.
ber of spots detected, the average
 Results
Image analysis parameters
Handsheets from the 100 and 1000
ppm target are plotted in Fig. 1. Note
that the detected area covered by
spots is plotted logarithmically and
changes over six order of magnitude
by changing the gray scale value
threshold. This again demonstrates
how important it is to select a mean-
ingful threshold. Since there is no
standardization available, we de-
cided to use a constant threshold of
155 (indicated by arrows in Fig. 1)
which is approximately 75% of the
average gray scale value of the batch
targeted with 1000 ppm.
Sample concentrations
of impurities
The actual ppm concentrations of
impurities and the number of spots
versus target ppm concentrations for
sides of individual handsheets are
plotted in Figs. 2 and 3, respectively.
Data acquired on the felt and wire
sides of the handsheets are both plot-
ted and may be distinguished by dif-
ferent symbols. Figure 2 demon-
strates that the absolute scatter of
detected ppm and number of spots
increases with increasing ppm. How-
ever, the scatter relative to the value
of ppm actually decreases with in-
creasing ppm, as shown by plotting
actual ppm divided by target ppm
versus target ppm, Fig. 4.
It was of interest to determine if
significant differences existed in par-
ticle population between the felt and
the wire side. No significant differ-
ence in ppm and number of spots
detected between the felt and wire
sides is distinguishable in the data
of Figs. 24. Figure 5 is a plot of the
difference in ppm of the wire minus
the felt side for 10 handsheets of
each batch. If an actual separation
was taking place inside the
handsheet mold, one would expect
that the data would cluster either
above or below the y = 0 line. More-
over, no correlation was found be-
tween ppm detected on the wire side
Vol. 78, No. 2 Tappi Journal 173
and the felt side for a handsheet
(Table I). This demonstrates that
even inside the handsheet mold, ran-
dom mixing was observed in this
study.
Random distribution of spots
As mentioned above, it can be shown
that the variance of counted features
is equal to the number of counted
features (13). For our theoretical
consideration, we applied this law.
It should therefore be possible to
demonstrate this behavior using the
experimental results. If one plots the
variance of the number of spots per
handsheet for each batch versus the
average number of spots per
handsheet, one should essentially
find a straight line at a 45 angle.
Figure 6 shows that the observation
of random distribution statistics
holds true for our samples. In the
plot, also included are the confidence
intervals of 50% and 80% (two-sided
intervals). It is expected that 50%
and 80% of the data will lie within
the 50% and 80% confidence inter-
vals, respectively, if random distri-
bution is true.
Comparison of the predicted
and actual error in ppm
Three errors in the area covered by
contaminants that will be discussed
in this section are briefly reviewed
in the following. All of these errors
are standard deviations and have
units of ppm. (a) The error that origi-
nates from the limitations in the re-
producibility of the image analysis
system is referred to as the scan-
ning error. This error was calculated
by performing image analysis twice
on the exact same sample, i.e., two
scans of each side of each handsheet.
With these results one can calculate
the standard deviation of the mea-
sured ppm for a single side of a
handsheet. (b) The error that was
calculated by simply determining the
standard deviation of the experimen-
tally detected ppm of wire and felt
sides of handsheets of a target ppm
batch, thereafter called the actual
error. (c) The error that is predicted
by Eq. 8 will be referred to as the
predicted error. To calculate this
error, the number of spots, the aver-
age spot size and the variance of the
spot size determined for each
handsheet was determined and sub-
stituted into Eq. 8.
The predicted error versus the
actual error is plotted in Fig. 7. Data
for both the felt and wire sides are
distinguished in the plot; however,
the results of the two sides are simi-
lar. The predicted error is shown to
be equal to the actual error, i.e., the
data are scattered about a 45 line
with an intercept of zero. This ob-
servation lends evidence to the
theory used to predict the actual er-
ror.
The actual error and the scan-
ning error are plotted versus the ac-
tual ppm values in Fig. 8. The results
demonstrate that the scanning er-
ror is much smaller than the actual
error at high ppm values. It is im-
portant to note that the scanning
error is small and reproducible us-
ing a single image analysis tech-
nique; however, as demonstrated in
Fig. 1, if different image analysis
techniques are used the differences
in results can be significant. Equa-
tion 10 allows prediction of the rela-
tive error in ppm given the average
particle size and standard deviation
of particle size. The prediction of the
relative error versus ppm is plotted
in Fig. 9. The value of Var(Ai)/AM2
was approximated as 1.5, as found in
our data. To demonstrate the sensi-
tivity of the prediction with respect
to this ratio, the curves generated
using ratio values of 0 (i.e.,
Var(Ai) = 0) and 5 are also plotted.
Also plotted in Fig. 9 is the actual
relative error of the data. The actual
relative error was determined for
each side of the handsheets at each
ppm level by dividing the
STDEV(AT) by the measured value
of AT and multiplying by 100%. The
predicted relative error adequately
fits the experimental results and fur-
ther supports the theory presented
in this work. Note that both the ac-
 Image analysis
II. Image analysis results on 25% post consumer recycled copy paper

Number of spots detected

Upper bound: 0.0215 0.0502 0.108 0.222 Avg. size, Std. dev., No. spots ppm
Lower bound: 0.0072 0.0215 0.0502 0.108 mm 2 mm2

Sheet Side
1 1 10 1 0 0 9.78E-03 6.63E-03 11 18.5
2 1 8 1 0 0 1.19E-02 7.17E-03 9 18.4
3 1 9 0 0 0 7.96E-03 2.39E-03 9 12.3
4 1 11 1 0 0 1.08E-02 8.37E-03 12 22.3
5 1 11 0 0 0 1.04E-02 4.93E-03 11 19.7
6 1 10 2 0 0 1.37E-02 8.35E-03 12 28.3
7 1 8 0 0 0 8.96E-03 5.07E-03 8 12.3
8 1 11 0 0 0 7.82E-03 2.16E-03 11 14.8
9 1 7 0 0 0 8.19E-03 2.71E-03 7 9.9
10 1 13 0 0 0 9.93E-03 4.66E-03 13 22.2
1 2 11 0 0 0 9.78E-03 4.83E-03 11 18.5
2 2 6 1 0 0 1.33e-02 1.05E-02 7 16.0
3 2 8 1 0 0 1.35E-02 9.10E-03 9 20.9
4 2 4 0 0 0 8.96E-03 3.58E-03 4 6.2
5 2 7 0 0 0 9.22E-03 3.50E-03 7 11.1
6 2 12 0 0 0 7.77E-03 2.07E-03 12 16.1
7 2 7 1 0 0 1.08E-02 7.66E-03 8 14.9
8 2 12 0 0 0 8.96E-03 3.24E-03 12 18.5
9 2 19 1 0 0 9.32E-03 5.74E-03 20 32.1
10 2 9 0 0 0 8.76E-03 3.16E-03 9 13.6

9.99E-03 5.29E-03 1.01E+01 17.3 <=Avg.

0.00185 0.00254 3.28 6.1 <=Std. dev.

35.25 <=SDEV%
(actual)

33.96 <=SDEV%
Predicted Eq. 10
Var( Ai)/AM2
= 0.28
Upper bound: upper border of spot class (in mm2)
Lower bound: lower border of spot class (in mm 2)
No spots were detected with areas greater than 0.05 mm 2.

Var(Ai)/AM2 = 0.28 = (5.29E-03/9.99E-03)2

tual and predicted relative errors
increase dramatically as the ppm
level decreases toward zero. In con-
trast to the relative errors, the abso-
lute error, SDEV(AT), both predicted
and actual, increase with increasing
ppm, see Eq. 8 and Fig. 8, respec-
tively.
Analysis of a commercial
recycled copy paper
To further explore the utility of the
statistical tools as described above,
image analysis was performed on a
commercial recycled content paper
suitable for high speed xerographic
equipment and laser printers. The
paper is specified as containing 25%
post-consumer fiber. Ten sheets of
paper were analyzed. The same im-
age analysis procedures as described
earlier were followed, including scan-
ning 3 x 3 in. areas of the sheets.
The results of the image analysis
are shown in Table II.
The average ppm of the area
scanned was found to be 17.3. The
ppm was calculated using detected
spots with sizes between 0.0007 and
0.05 mm2; many detected spots were
less than 0.04 mm2, the minimum
reported plot size for TAPPI Method
T 437 om-90, Dirt in Paper and Pa-
perboard. For this reason the ppm
level reported here is expected to be
higher than that reported using the
TAPPI method.
The value of SDEV% of a sheet
was found to be 35.3%. The value of
SDEV% predicted by Eq. 10 with
Var(Ai)/AM2 = 0.28, from data in
Table II, was 34.0% (Table II). The
excellent agreement between the
actual and predicted values gives fur-
ther validation of the derivation of
Eq. 10.

174 February 1995 Tappi Journal

 Discussion
As demonstrated in Fig. 1, our re-
sults show again that image analysis
is very sensitive to the chosen pa-
rameters. It demonstrates that it is
almost impossible to compare results
made with different image analysis
systems, yet even with different sys-
tem parameters on the same sys-
tem. It seems therefore urgent to
define standards that allow for a
comparison of results from different
labs.
Again, our previously reported
criteria (5) of setting the threshold
at about 75% of the average gray
scale value proved to be useful. It
should be mentioned, however, that
the statistical results reported herein
do not depend on the setting of the
threshold or any machine setting, as
long as the settings are kept con-
stant.
The results show, in general, that
indeed the random distribution of
impurities in samples plays a much
greater role than the scanning mea-
surement error in determining the
error of an estimation of pulp impu-
rities. Even the two sides of the same
handsheet in this study can be re-
garded as essentially independent
(Table I), due to the mixing in the
handsheet mold and the relatively
large particles in reference to the
wire openings. Thus, when one is
confronted with the choice to either
increase the resolution to measure
the present impurities more accu-
rately or to increase the area to be
scanned and thereby increase the
number of spots counted, one should
choose the latter, in general. This
statement, of course, is only valid as
long as a resolution of 300 dots per
inch or greater is used and one is
only interested in visible impurities.
As far as the reproducibility of mea-
surements are concerned, our results
*
Adding or removing a cluster to a scanned
area will vary the number of counted
features much more than expected from a
random distribution of unclustered
particles.
Vol. 78, No. 2 Tappi Journal 175
give further evidence that a simple
office scanner is adequate for the
task of analyzing visible impurities.
Figure 6 demonstrates that the
impurities are randomly distributed.
The random distribution, however,
would be destroyed if the impurities
had a tendency to cluster. In cases
where the impurities tend to cluster
together, but the scanner is still able
to recognize each individual impu-
rity, the predicted error, calculated
using Eq. 10, will significantly un-
derestimate the actual error.*
The results show that, even
though the absolute value of the er-
ror due to random distribution in-
creases with higher impurity levels,
its relative value, meaning the error
divided by the measured value, de-
creases with higher impurity levels.
Typically, one is more interested in
the relative size of the error, since a
difference of 20 ppm is much more
important at an impurity level of 20
ppm than at 200 ppm.
General statistical considerations
demonstrate that the size of the er-
ror can be decreased by scanning
larger areas. Therefore, consider-
ations pertaining to the size of the
scanned area that is necessary to
achieve an appropriate accuracy
grow increasingly important with
lower levels of impurities.
The actual relative error essen-
tially follows Eq. 10 when param-
eters of the spot population of the
experimental system are employed
(Fig. 9). We therefore conclude that
our general equation can be adopted
to estimate the error of a given, mea-
sured sample. Moreover, this equa-
tion can be used to estimate the area
that has to be scanned to achieve a
certain confidence interval before-
hand, when information on spread
and average size of the population of
spots is available or may be approxi-
mated. With Eq. 10, charts can be
created that allow a simple graphi-
cal determination of the needed area
to be analyzed. These charts and
their use are presented and dis-
cussed in the companion paper (7).
The charts can then be used without
a thorough knowledge of the theory
presented here.
Conclusion
The results herein demonstrate that
the most important contributor to
the error in image analysis is the
fact that typical impurities are ran-
domly distributed in pulp. Based on
theoretical considerations of a ran-
dom distribution of impurities in
pulp, an expected error was calcu-
lated and compared with actual find-
ings using handsheets of different
but known total concentration of im-
purities. Theory and experimental
results agreed well over a range of
impurity concentration from 10 to
1000 ppm. TJ
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The authors would like to thank Prof. Giesbrecht
(Dept. of Statistics, North Carolina State Uni-
versity) for helpful discussions. C. Zeyer was
supported by Ciba Geigy, Basel, Switzerland.
K.W. Puangchinda was supported by the J.
Stanford Smith Graduate Fellowship, Interna-
tional Paper Co.
Received for review June 14, 1994.
Accepted Sept. 30, 1994.