Automated Mosaic Imaging (using Stage.exe)

[Mike Matthews]

OK, it's almost certainly the beam scan calibration in PI I've missed - I'd assumed it would pick up the Probewin.ini settings. I would use the beam and stage scan calibration method except that I have an instrument problem with my stage scanning at the moment (strangely it doesn't affect the stage moves between beam scan images). I'll give the Surfer method a go too.

Multiple image loading would be very much appreciated- opening 61 images one by one gets tedious very quickly!

[John Donovan]

Multiple image loading would be very much appreciated- opening 61 images one by one gets tedious very quickly!

I agree.   But at least with the Surfer mosaic method you simply select all the images using the <ctrl> a keyboard shortcut, and they all get loaded quickly.

[Mike Matthews]

Got it working with Surfer (although it did take me a while to work out how to convert the Surfer Grid file into an actual image). I checked the beam calibration settings in Probe Image but even when I'd set the values to exactly the same as the lines in probewin.ini I still got the same error message about the image not being registered.

Is there a way to display the mosaic image in the stage map window so I can use it to navigate? I opened it in the digitise window so I know I can use it to store analysis points.

[John Donovan]

Got it working with Surfer (although it did take me a while to work out how to convert the Surfer Grid file into an actual image). I checked the beam calibration settings in Probe Image but even when I'd set the values to exactly the same as the lines in probewin.ini I still got the same error message about the image not being registered.

Hi Mike, This doesn't make sense, so clearly "what we have here is a failure to communicate"!   So let's start with this:

1. Acquire a small (e.g., 128 pixel wide) beam scan image in Probe Image.

2. Once acquired, is the image calibrated?  That is, when you move your cursor over the image, do you see the x, y stage coordinate values displaying appropriate values?

Is there a way to display the mosaic image in the stage map window so I can use it to navigate? I opened it in the digitise window so I know I can use it to store analysis points.

Easiest thing is to simply open the GRD file in PictureSnap.  Just use the File | Import GRD File menu and you should be good to go!

Here is an example of a Stage.exe mosaic of one of my standard blocks loaded into PictureSnap:

[macosta]

Does anyone know what this error means (see attachment) ?

It comes up when I attempt to use the Mosaic | Grid command [in the Surfer application from Golden Software].

[Probeman]

Does anyone know what this error means (see attachment) ?

It comes up when I attempt to use the Mosaic | Grid command [in the Surfer application from Golden Software].

Are those Chinese characters?   

I would send the error message to support@goldensoftware.com
john

[Probeman]

It occurs to me that with all this discussion on getting raw image data in and out of our applications I should make available the code we use to read/write Surfer GRD files. This is a proprietary format from Golden Software, but they freely provide documentation on the format. That said, sometimes it is easier to just read the damn code!

Attached below is the code module for reading and writing Surfer GRD files, though it is also available on the CalcZAF GitHub site:

https://github.com/openmicroanalysis/calczaf

The VB6 code attached below has routines for the old v. 6 GRD format, though since about 2005 we only utilize v. 7 format which is the format used still today by Golden Software. The main read/write routine for the current GRD format is called (appropriately enough!), GridFileReadWrite2(). There are several other routines for reading the header data, and also for reading the GRDInfo.ini file which we create to indicate the stage units and polarity (cartesian for Cameca vs. anti-cartesian for JEOL).

That said, it is a really easy format and all the data is stored as 32 floats so almost any data type can be utilized. In fact the GRD format is the native format for CalcImage which is Probe Software's quantitative mapping software.  This allows CalcImage to calculate, store and output fully quantitative x-ray map data whether it be net intensities, k-ratios, detection limits, weight%, atomic%, etc., etc.:

https://probesoftware.com/smf/index.php?topic=41.msg4167#msg4167