Development and Testing of a Non-Recording Microdensitometer

A need exists in American industry for a small-area reading densitometer. The object of this effort was to examine optical designs proposed by Photographic Sciences Corporation, to formulate a reasonable system design, and to work this design into a prototype instrument. After testing several optical designs, one was chosen that proved its feasibility on the micro-optical bench. A case was designed for the unit and the optical system made of microscope components was set into place. A photomultiplier tube and amplifier were incorporated as the photometric measuring device. The system was tested and proved to exhibit the qualities of a compact, non-recording, small-area densitometer