Digital-image-based analysis of fiber-reinforced composites: a review

Abstract

Over the past century, image-based analysis techniques have been widely employed for characterizing the microstructures, deformations, and failure behaviors of materials owing to the development of imaging technology and computational resources. Image-based analysis techniques are practical and effective for the two-dimensional measurements of an object surface. Currently, out-of-plane and subsurface measurements can be performed in conjunction with stereographic and tomographic techniques. Consequently, image-based studies have been widely conducted to investigate heterogeneous microstructures and complex failure behaviors of fiber-reinforced polymer (FRP) composites. Previous studies on FRP composites using image-based techniques have been reviewed in this paper. They are categorized into three groups based on the type of images being analyzed: (1) binary image analysis, (2) digital image correlation analysis using two or three dimensional stereographic images, (3) digital volume correlation analysis using volumetric images.