Digital Image Acquisition and Processing
Quartz PCI is the preferred image acquisition and archiving solution of thousands of researchers around the world. PCI helps you manage all aspects of the imaging process including acquisition, annotation, archiving and retrieval.
Specialized modules are available for acquisition from SEMs, STEMs, TEMs, light microscopes, video sources, TWAIN devices and virtually any other kind of imaging instrument.
Quartz PCI Slow-Scan acquires high-resolution, slow-scan images from any manufacturer's SEM and STEM instruments without interfering in any way with normal microscope operation.
Quartz PCI reads digital images, with calibration information, from PC-based SEMs from most manufacturers, including FEI, Hitachi, Tescan and Zeiss.
Quartz PCI AMT provides a direct software interface to AMT's Digital CCD Camera Systems that permits images to be transferred to PCI directly from the AMT software.
Quartz PCI Video captures images from any video source, such as a camera-equipped light microscope. PCI TWAIN acquires images from TWAIN devices, such as digital cameras and scanners.
Using techniques such as hot folder monitoring, PCI can bring in images from virtually any image producing device. PCI supports importing images in a multitude of image file formats.
Quartz PCI Office is used for offline viewing, processing and analysis of images acquired with Quartz PCI Lab. PCI Office includes all of the functionality of PCI Lab, except for image acquisition.
Once the images are acquired, PCI Lab & Office provide a complete set of processing and display functions including image zooming, pseudo-coloring, brightness, contrast and gamma adjustment, color correction, smoothing, sharpening etc. Anaglyph stereo images can be constructed and aligned. PCI Lab & Office can even be extended with custom processing and analysis functions by taking advantage of its "plug-in" interface for programmers. Images can be annotated with PCI’s drawing tools, which operate on a separate "overlay layer". You can move or edit the overlay elements at any time without affecting the image underneath. Tools are included for length, area and angle measurement.
PCI Lab & Office include powerful tools to help you access and manage your images intuitively and to turn those images into usable information. Quartz Imaging’s scalable family of high-performance database solutions can help a single microscopist keep track of hundreds of images or help an entire organization keep track of millions of them.
The Workgroup Database is included with every copy of PCI Lab & Office. Designed for facilities with up to approximately 10 users, the Workgroup Database provides a simple, yet powerful, introduction to image database systems.
Based on Microsoft® SQL Server™, PCI’s Enterprise Database supports thousands of users, millions of records and terabytes of data in a robust, enterprise-grade environment.
Quartz Imaging’s Intranet Image Server allows anyone connected to the network to perform queries and retrieve images and other documents from the PCI database using a standard Web browser.
PCI includes a full–featured report layout tool. After you have acquired your images, or even while you are acquiring them, PCI makes it easy to produce polished, professional reports.
PCI database fields can be placed on the report and automatically filled with database information pertaining to the associated image. The same tools that are available for annotating images are available for adding annotations to the report. Master pages and templates facilitate the development of standard reports for your organization, incorporating elements such as corporate logos.
Reports can be exported in the Microsoft® Word and Microsoft® PowerPoint® file formats, so that you can continue working on them in the Microsoft® Office environment. Finished reports can be exported in the PDF for easy distribution to your colleagues and clients.
In addition to acquiring your images, Quartz PCI lets you view and annotate x-ray spectra, both at the instrument and at your office workstations. Data from the Quartz XOne X-Ray Microanalysis System can be read directly and data from other vendor’s equipment can be imported via the EMSA format. Tools are provided to identify elements, label peaks and add other annotations. Spectra can be exported as images anad copied via the clipboard into other software packages.