Genetic Algorithms to Automatic Weld Bead
Detection in Double Wall Double Image Digital
Radiographs
Tania M. Centeno and
Leyza Dorini and
Myriam R. Delgado
Academic Department of
Informatics (DAINF)
Graduate Program on Electrical Engineering
and Computer Science (CPGEI)
Federal University of Technology of Paraná
Av. Sete de Setembro, 3165, Centro
Curitiba, Brazil, CEP 80230-901
Fone: +55 41 33104644, 33104679
Fax: +55 41 33104683
Email: mezzadri@utfpr.edu.br
Email: leyza@dainf.ct.utfpr.edu.br
Email: myriamdelg@utfpr.edu.br
Abstract—Weld bead detection is essential for fully automatic
identification of flaws on welded joints through digital radio-
graphic inspection. This paper presents an approach based on
Genetic Algorithms (GA) and template matching to detect weld
beads in Double Wall Double Image (DWDI) digital radiographs.
Pipe or weld bead pre-defined models are compared to radiog-
raphy sampled pixels whose locations are defined by candidate
solutions provided by the GA. The fitness of each individual
is evaluated based on a linear combination of its phenotype
and genotype (this later evaluated by an heuristic function). At
the end of the evolutionary process, the best individual in the
population indicates the position, orientation and dimensions of
the pipe or weld bead in the image. The proposed approach
successfully detects pipe and weld beads in all the 16 radiographs
used for parameters setting and performance evaluation. The
system represents an important contribution as there is no
previous works concerning automatic weld bead detection for
this kind of image.
I. I NTRODUCTION
Weld bead detection in digital radiographic images is a
fundamental step for automatic defects segmentation in weld
bead inspection processes [8], [9]. This step consists in iso-
lating the weld bead as a region of interest (ROI), in which
defects can be identified and segmented using a diversity of
image processing techniques, like morphological bottom-hat
filtering [1], Otsu’s global thresholding and Sauvola’s local
thresholding [11]–[13], Gaussian filtering [13] and background
subtraction [14]. Important improvements have been observed
in this area as described by Silva and Mery [2], [3]. However,
most of approaches assume that the weld bead has been
manually isolated beforehand.
Marcel Kroetz and
Vitor Fylyk and
Allan Vieira and
Marcelo Felisberto and
Luı́s Alberto Lucas
Graduate Program on Electrical Engineering
and Computer Science (CPGEI)
Federal University of Technology of Paraná
Email: marcelkroetz@yahoo.com
Email: vfylyk@gmail.com
Email: allanpvieira@gmail.com
Email: marcelokfelisberto@gmail.com
Email: lalucas@utfpr.edu.br
Felisberto et al. [4], [5] presented a methodology to perform
the weld bead extraction from digital radiographs based on
template matching and genetic algorithms. That proposed
methodology uses a model image and works successfully
extracting weld beads from panoramic, Single Wall Single
Image (SWSI) and Double Wall Single Image (DWSI) ra-
diographs. However, Lim et al. [10] claim that the technique
described in [4] and [5] depends on an image model obtained
from the inspected radiographs themselves and therefore it
is not applicable to all possible variations of weld bead
geometry. Furthermore, the method is limited to SWSI and
DWSI radiographs. Lim, Ratnam and Khalid [10] have also
proposed an approach for weld bead extraction from SWSI
and DWSI radiographs using grey level intensity profiles.
They use a maximum intensity to divide the intensity profiles
in two parts. In each part, least square lines were fitted to
their data points using a predefined range threshold. The weld
bead boundary points on each part are found using error
threshold. However, the proposed approach requires that the
pixel having the highest intensity value in the weld bead profile
is precisely in the center of the weld bead which makes this
method sensitive to the presence of other objects in image,
like image quality indicators (IQI) and placeholders. Moreover,
the method is not suitable for extraction of weld beads from
Double Wall Double Image (DWDI) radiographs.
In this paper, we extend the method presented by Felisberto
et al. [4], [5] proposing the weld bead extraction from DWDI
radiographs in which the weld beads have ellipsoidal shape.
As the previous work, the proposed methodology combines
 Fig. 1. DWDI radiographic testing.
genetic algorithms and template matching to detect the weld
bead, though the detection is performed in two steps. First,
the pipe is detected in the radiography, and after that, the
weld bead is detected over the pipe. It is important to mention
that the problem of detecting weld bead in DWDI radiographs
has not yet been addressed by previous works. Thus, there
is a difficulty in comparing the results of this work with
similar approaches dealing with the same problem. Besides
the novelty concerning detection of weld beads in DWDI
radiographs, other contributions of the paper are the proposed
modeling aspects, use of an evolutionary algorithm to solve the
addressed problem, combination of phenotype and heuristic
function in the fitness calculation, and finally, wide range of
the parameter configuration experiments.
II. BACKGROUND
This section describes some basic concepts of the addressed
problem and a general overview of the genetic algorithm-based
proposed solution.
A. Double Wall Double Image Radiographs
Double wall double images (DWDI) radiographs are the
ones obtained from exposition of the welded joint to an X-
Ray source, which is located outside of the pipeline, side by
side with the weld bead, as depicted in Figure 1. The source is
positioned slightly far from the pipe, yet close enough to the
beam do not miss the nearest part of the weld. This technique
is mainly applied in all cases where it is impossible to keep
film or source inside the pipe (e.g. pipes with outside diameters
inferior than 90mm). According to [7], in DWDI we have
radiographic images in which both walls of a tubular section
are superimposed one by another resulting in an elliptical
image as shown in Figure 2, and at least two images of
each welded joint are necessary for a complete weld bead
inspection.
In this paper, we consider a set of 16 digital X-Ray images
of 9 welded joints, like that depicted in Figure 2.
B. Genetic Algorithms
In our proposed approach the image matching procedure is
based on Genetic Algorithms (GAs). GA is a search and op-
timization algorithm inspired by natural selection and natural
genetics [6]. In this work we used a standard implementation
of a GA as summarized in the following steps:
1) Initialize the population (usually in a random way)
Fig. 2. DWDI radiography: (a) pipe wall; (b,d) Image Quality Indicator (IQI);
(c) welded joint; (e) tag indicating the angle of welded joint exposition.
2) Evaluate candidate solutions by the fitness function
3) Select mates for reproduction
4) Apply genetic operators: crossover and mutation
5) While the stopping criterion is not met, resume to step 2
Within an iterative procedure, the fittest individuals of a
population of candidate solutions are selected and reproduced
by genetic operators like crossover and mutation, evolving to
optimal or near optimal solutions [15].
III. M ODELS CONSTRUCTION
The problem of detecting weld beads in radiographic images
can be defined as the identification of position, orientation and
dimensions of pipes and weld beads for further processing.
In this work, it is addressed as an image matching problem.
Pipe or weld bead pre-defined models are compared with
radiography sampled pixels whose locations are defined by
candidate solutions provided by a Genetic Algorithm (GA).
At the end of the evolutionary process, the best individual in
the population indicates position, orientation and dimensions
of the pipe or weld bead in the image.
The adopted technique is similar to that proposed by Fe-
lisberto et. al. [4], [5] for detecting weld beads in SWSI
and DWSI radiographs. In this paper, we also use GAs to
search regions in the radiographic image that well-matches
pipe or weld bead models. The main difference is that now,
both models are directly generated as reference matrices.
In this paper, the pipe model (Mpipe ) is a nlin ×ncol matrix
with pixel values calculated by (1).

3.33 |β|
 if |β| < 0.3
mpipe
i,j = −10.0 |β| + 4.0 if 0.3 6 |β| < 0.4 (1)


0 if |β| ≥ 0.4
where, pixel values range from 0.0 (black) to 1.0 (white) and
β = (i/(nlin − 1)) − 0.5.
Figure 3 illustrates the graphical representation of Mpipe .
In the same way, the weld bead model is generated by (2)
as a reference matrix (Mweld ).
mweld
i,j = min {1.0, max[0, 2.0 | cos α| − 1.0] + ψ} (2)
where
1
ψ = 1.0 ,
1 + e24 |β|−6

Fig. 3. Pipe model illustration.
and
j θ ∈ [−π/4, +π/4]
α = 2π . weld bead
ncol
In the weld bead matching process, pixels are sampled over
an ellipse, thus this model must be overlaid on a polar plane
as depicted in Figure 4.
Fig. 4. Weld bead model illustration.
The approach proposed in this paper to define pipe and weld
bead models results in a more flexible model representation,
as it eliminates the need of sampling images to define the
reference matrices.
IV. T HE GA- BASED APPROACH
In the proposed approach, the GA is executed in a sequence
of two independent evolutionary processes to detect both pipe
and weld bead: firstly it evolves along a certain number of
generations (according to the steps described in Section II-B)
only to detect the pipe from the original radiography. Secondly
it evolves again, but now to detect the weld bead over the
pipe, whose position was obtained in previews GA run. In
both evolutionary processes, a candidate solution (individual)
in the population encodes the parameters that define which
pixels will be sampled and stored into a sample matrix (Mimg )
(Section IV-A1).
Each pipe chromosome Pi is encoded as a vector of six
parameters (real numbers) which defines a candidate solution
(Pi = (x, y, w, h, ww , θ)) describing the position, orientation
and dimensions for the pipe. Analogously, each weld bead
chromosome Wi is encoded as a vector (Wi = (l, r2 , h2 , ch ))
which defines a candidate solution for the weld bead. All these
parameters are described in Table I.
As an example of the adopted encoding and its impact in
the evolutionary process, Figures 5 and 6 illustrate the results
for pipe and weld bead individuals sampled at two different
stages in the evolution.
In Figure 5 we have the individuals Pi0 = the fitness calculation is another contribution of this paper.
(x, y, w, h, ww , θ) = (1221, 1710, 4235, 1285, 0.90, 1.96)
and Wi0 = (l, r2 , h2 , ch ) = (1294, 24, 473, −0.181) taken
from the initial population.
TABLE I
PARAMETERS ENCODED INTO PIPE AND WELD BEAD chromosomes
Parameter Description and ranges
pipe
x horizontal position of pipe center, range: x ∈
[25%, 75%]% of the image width
y vertical position of pipe center, range y ∈
[25%, 75%] of the image height
w pipe width, w ∈ [50%, 100%] of the image width
h pipe height, h ∈ [20%, 100%] of the image height
ww pipe’s wall thickness, ww ∈ [0.1, 0.4] of the pipe
height
θ pipe orientation (measured in radians),
l longitudinal position of the weld bead center (relative
to the center of the pipe), l ∈ [−50%, +50%] of w
r2 second diameter of the weld bead ellipsis (relative
to effective pipe height he = (0.5 − 0.1ww )h),
r2 ∈ [0, 60%] of he
h2 weld bead ellipsis width (relative to pipe’s wall
thickness), h2 ∈ [0.2%, 0.4%] of ww
ch middle line adjustment of the weld bead ellipsis (for
improving asymmetrical weld bead detection), ch ∈
[−25%, +25%] of h2
Fig. 5. Pipe and weld bead individuals (at the initial population).
M axGen
Figure 6 shows the best individuals Pbest =
(x, y, w, h, ww , θ) = (946, 2042, 3708, 1247, 0.73, 1.57) and
M axGen
Wbest = (l, r2 , h2 , ch ) = (58, 160, 345, −0.104) taken
from the final population (at the end of the evolutionary
process).
A. Fitness evaluation
In the pipe and weld bead detection, the fitness of each
individual is calculated by a linear combination of their
phenotype evaluation and heuristic function, as in (3).
f itness = 0.8 phenotype + 0.2 heuristic (3)
Other weights were tested but those values (0.8 and 0.2)
provided the best results. In the case of phenotype evaluation,
we aim to evaluate the quality of a candidate solution when
compared with the corresponding model (pipe or weld bead
reference matrix). In heuristic function, we evaluate how far is
the solution from a standard genotype (i.e, usual position, ori-
entation and dimensions of pipes and weld beads in the context
of radiography inspection). Combining both components into
1) Phenotype evaluation: In the phenotype evaluation for
pipes individuals, the encoded parameters are used to calculate
a sampling grid indicating which pixels will be sampled from
 (a1) (b1)

(a2) (b2)

(a3) (b3)

Fig. 6. Pipe and weld bead best individuals (at the final population).

the radiographic image to provide the sample matrix Mimg .

Such matrix will be further compared with the reference matrix (a4) (b4)
Mpipe that defines the pipe model.
Equations from (4) to (8) define the coordinates of the set
of points to be associated with the sampling grid for a pipe
individual, and their further geometrical transformations.
(a5) (b5)

j i
Gxi,j = + 0.5 Gyi,j = + 0.5 (4)
ncol − 1 nlin − 1
( (a) (b)
0 ww Gyi,j + 0.5(1.0 − ww )) if Gyi,j >= 0
Gyi,j = (5) Fig. 7. Sampling grid. (a) pipe detection: (a1) points distribution; (a2) wall
ww Gyi,j − 0.5(1.0 − ww ) if Gyi,j < 0 thickness adjustment; (a3) scale; (a4) rotation; (a5) translation; (b) weld bead
detection: (b1) points distribution; (b2) center line adjustment; (b3) scale and
00 00 0 curve to an ellipse; (b4) rotation and (b5) translation.
Gxi,j = wGxi,j Gyi,j = hGyi,j (6)
000 00 00
Gxi,j = Gxi,j cos θ + Gyi,j sin θ are sampled from the radiographic image and stored into
000 00 00 (7)
Gyi,j = −Gxi,j sin θ + Gyi,j cos θ Mimg . The sample matrix Mimg for each individual is then
compared with the reference matrix, defining this way the
0000 000 0000 000 phenotype evaluation of such individual as Eq. (9), with Mpipe
Gxi,j = Gxi,j + x Gyi,j = Gyi,j + y (8)
as Mref .
X |Mref − Mimg |
where Gxi,j is the horizontal coordinate of each sampling grid phenotype = 1.0 − (9)
max. dissimilarity
point and Gyi,j its respective vertical coordinate. The remaining
parameters are those encoded into pipe chromosome described where max. dissimilarity is defined by the maximum dissimi-
in Table I. larity between black and white pixels (|white − black|).
Figure 7(a) illustrates the operations performed by these If a grid position leads to a pixel outside the image, no pixel
equations. They are described as follows: is sampled and such position is marked as invalid. Addition-
1) Begin with a set of points distributed over a regularly ally, as a penalty, the maximum dissimilarity is assigned to
spaced grid, with coordinates ranging from -0.5 to +0.5 that point.
units, as defined by Eq. (4) and illustrated in Figure 7(a1) As in the case of pipe detection, each individual in the weld
2) Adjust the lines of the grid to fit in the wall thickness bead detection is evaluated as a candidate solution for defining
of the candidate solution and leave the center of the grid the best matching of the weld bead over the detected pipe.
empty, as defined by Eq. (5) and illustrated in Figure Equation (4) plus equations (10) to (13) define the calculation
7(a2) of a set of points (or positions) that will be used as a sampling
3) Scale the grid to the width and height of the candidate grid for the weld bead detection, where Gxi,j is the horizontal
solution, as defined by Eq. (6) and illustrated in Figure coordinate of sampling grid points and Gyi,j their respective
7(a3) vertical coordinates. The remaining parameters are the ones
4) Rotate the grid to match the candidate solution orienta- encoded into pipe chromosome as described in Table I.
tion, as defined by Eq. (7) and illustrated in Figure 7(a4) Such operations are illustrated in Figure 7 (b) and are
5) Translate the grid to match the candidate solution position described as follow:
in the radiographic image, as defined by Eq. (8) and 1) Begin with a set of points distributed over a regularly
illustrated in Figure 7(a5) spaced grid, with coordinates ranging from -0.5 to +0.5
After generating the sampling grid based on chromosome units, as defined by Eq. (4) and illustrated by Figure 7
parameters for every pipe individual in the population, pixels (b1)
  TABLE II
0
 0.5−cyh
0.5Gi,j
if Gyi,j >= 0 PARAMETERS USED IN THE HEURISTIC FUNCTION .
Gyi,j = (10)
ch +0.5
 0.5Gy if Gyi,j < 0 Parameter Weight Standard value Max. dissimilarity
i,j pipe
x 0.10 50% of image’s 50% of image’s
00
Gxi,j = (0.5 − 0.1ww )h cos (2πGxi,j ) width width
00 0 (11) y 0.10 50% of image’s 50% of images
Gyi,j = r2 sin (2πGxi,j ) + h2 Gyi,j height height
w 0.35 100% of image’s 50% of image’s
000 00 00 width width
Gxi,j = Gxi,j cos (θ − π2 ) + Gyi,j sin (θ − π2 ) h 0.35 80% of image’s 60% of image’s
000 00 00 (12) height height
Gyi,j = −Gxi,j sin (θ − π
2) + Gyi,j cos (θ − π
2)
θ 0.10 zero π/4
weld bead
0000 000 l 0.20 zero 50% of pipe’s
Gxi,j = Gxi,j + x + l cos θ width (w)
0000 000 (13) r2 0.20 30% of effective 50% of effective
Gyi,j = Gyi,j + x + l sin θ pipe’s height pipe’s height
(0.5 − 0.1ww )h (0.5 − 0.1ww )h
h2 0.60 35% of pipe’s 40% of pipe’s wall
wall thickness thickness (ww h)
(ww h)
2) Adjust the lines of the grid so that its center line matches
the adjusted center line of the candidate solution, as
defined by Eq. (10) and illustrated by Figure 7 (b2)
positions, orientations and dimensions of pipes and weld beads
3) Scale and curve the grid to an ellipse that fit in the pipe
usually found in the application context). Moreover, it may
and match the dimensions of the candidate solution, as
provide a kind of noise filtering as it prevents the GA from
defined by Eq. (11) and illustrated by Figure 7 (b3)
finding out solutions (pipes or weld beads) distant from their
4) Rotate the grid to match the orientation of the pipe, as
usually locations.
defined by Eq. (12) and illustrated in Figure 7 (b4)
In Section VI we present the results comparing the perfor-
5) Then, translate the grid to match the candidate solution
mance of the proposed approach with and without the heuristic
position over the pipe, as defined by Eq. (13) and illus-
function.
trated in Figure 7 (b5)
In the same way as pipe detection, after generating the B. Selection and Genetic Operators
sampling grid based on chromosome parameters for every weld After being evaluated, some individuals are selected for
bead individual in the population, pixels are sampled from reproduction. This selection process is based on a stochastic
the radiographic image and stored into Mimg . Thereafter, the tournament, in which individuals are randomly chosen in pairs,
sample matrix Mimg for each individual is compared with the and their fitness are compared. The individual with the highest
reference matrix, defining this way the phenotype evaluation fitness returns to the population and the other is discarded.
of such individual as (9), with Mweld as Mref . This operation is repeated until the population is reduced to a
In all the experiments performed in Sections V and VI, desired amount of individuals selected for reproduction. The
we used pipe and weld bead sampling grids with 48 lines lower the amount of individuals selected for reproduction,
× 17 columns and 27 lines × 32 columns, respectively. The the greater the selective pressure, and then faster is the GA
procedure of image matching using so small sampling grids convergence, nevertheless this increases the probability of
is an important aspect of the present paper as it allows a fast premature convergence to a local optimum. Section V details
and lightweight image matching process. the definition of appropriate values for the population size
2) Heuristic function: In addition to the phenotype evalu- and number of selected individuals, ensuring the best GA
ation, each individual is evaluated using an heuristic function performance considering all the tested parameters.
based on a ”standard” genotype. The heuristic function After the selection process, the genetic operators are ap-
defined by Eq. (14) is simply a weighted and normalized plied. For this, firstly the survival individuals are picked
similarity metric, calculated comparing the candidate solution randomly at pairs to reproduce and an offspring is generated
to the standard genotype. from these parents. In this step, crossover is the most important
operator; it combines alleles from both parents to form the
X |standard − candidate|
heuristic = 1.0 − weight (14) offspring’s chromosome. In this implementation, homogeneous
max. dissimilarity
crossover is used, so each offspring allele has a probability of
Table II lists the ”standard” values defined for each being inherited from the first or from the second parent. As
chromosome parameter, their corresponding weights, defined pointed by [16], in real parameter optimization, the crossover
through a refinement process, and normalizing factors both need to be performed in a inter-exons fashion to reduce
used in (14). disruption effects of crossover operations. Then, only exon-
The heuristic function is added to improve the search as by-exon crossover probability was set (see Table III), letting
it drives the solutions into standard values directions (i.e, the overall crossover probability for two different individuals
be the joint probability of at least one inter-exon crossover
(poverall
cross = 1−(1−pcross
inter−exon (
) cromossomelength)). Thus
it ranges around 9.5% to 100% in pipe detection and 7.7%
to 100% in subsequent weld bead detection. Additionally, the
mutation operator is applied, replacing an allele by a randomly
generated value accordingly to the range of the corresponding
parameter.
V. S ETTING THE GA PARAMETERS
The GAs performance is highly influenced by the choice of
their operational parameters, like the population size, number
of selected individuals to reproduction, crossover and mutation
rates. An exhaustive grid search is conducted to define the best
configuration considering a set of tested parameters both in
pipe and weld bead detection as shown in Table III.
VI. T ESTING AND R ESULTS
The resulting GA-based approaches (i.e, those with the best
configurations defined in the previous section) were applied to
the subset of eight remaining images out of the set of sixteen
images described in Section II.
In this section, the experiments were divided in two groups:
with and without the heuristic function.
Table IV shows the results (mean and standard deviation of
the final fitness among 30 runs) for each image used in the
test phase considering the absence of heuristic function in the
fitness calculation.
TABLE IV
F INAL F ITNESS ( WITHOUT THE HEURISTIC FUNCTION ) FOR THE TESTED
IMAGES .

TABLE III Image Fitness = Phenotype % Detection

T ESTED GA OPERATIONAL PARAMETERS . pipe
A 0.836 ± 0.004 100
Parameter pipe weld bead B 0.823 ± 0.005 100
Pop size {30, 60, 90, 120, 150} {90, 120, 150} C 0.861 ± 0.002 100
MaxGen {30, 60, 90, 120, 150} {90, 120, 150} D 0.848 ± 0.001 100
Selection(%) {50, 30, 10} {50, 30, 10} E 0.774 ± 0.001 0.00
Crossover {0.5, 0.1, 0.05} {0.5, 0.1, 0.05} F 0.755 ± 0.001 100
Mutation {0.14, 0.05, 0.02, 0.01} {0.25, 0.1, 0.02} G 0.767 ± 0.005 100
Combinations 900 243 H 0.797 ± 0.004 70.0
weld bead
A 0.552 ± 0.008 80.0
To set the GA parameters we selected a subset (configura- B 0.576 ± 0.011 93.3
tion image set) of 8 images taken from the complete set of 16 C 0.596 ± 0.010 100
D 0.581 ± 0.009 93.3
images available in the test bed described in Section II. Each E 0.496 ± 0.015 0.00
possible parameters combination (from a total of 900 and 243, F 0.522 ± 0.014 40.0
for pipe and weld bead detection) was tested in every image of G 0.533 ± 0.012 96.7
H 0.566 ± 0.009 30.0
the configuration image set. Due to stochastic characteristics of
evolutionary algorithms, GA was run 10 times for each image,
and the lowest fitness (worst case) reached at the end of all 10 Table V shows the results (mean and standard deviation of
runs was assigned to the pair (image, parameters combination). the final fitness among 30 runs) for each image used in the test
Then, the overall performance of each parameters combination phase using the complete fitness (with the heuristic function).
was achieved by the mean performance among these eight
images of the configuration image set. The best configurations TABLE V
F INAL F ITNESS FOR THE TESTED IMAGES .
for pipe and weld bead detection are emphasized in Table III
and described in the following. Image Phenotype Heuristic Fitness Detection
For pipe detection: 150 individuals in the popula- pipe %
A 0.808 ± 0.011 0.794 ± 0.025 0.805 ± 0.005 96.7
tion, a total of 90 generations, 45 individuals selected B 0.816 ± 0.011 0.804 ± 0.019 0.814 ± 0.006 96.7
for reproduction with 50% of probability of each C 0.847 ± 0.003 0.827 ± 0.016 0.843 ± 0.001 100
allele being inherited from each parent and 14% of D 0.843 ± 0.004 0.822 ± 0.009 0.838 ± 0.002 100
E 0.757 ± 0.002 0.852 ± 0.015 0.776 ± 0.002 100
probability of each allele being replaced by a new F 0.748 ± 0.002 0.823 ± 0.015 0.762 ± 0.002 100
random generated value. G 0.741 ± 0.005 0.928 ± 0.018 0.779 ± 0.003 100
For weld bead detection: 120 individuals in the H 0.777 ± 0.004 0.934 ± 0.023 0.808 ± 0.003 100
population, a total of 120 generations, 60 individuals weld bead %
A 0.541 ± 0.021 0.987 ± 0.008 0.630 ± 0.016 96.7
selected for reproduction with 50% of probability of B 0.575 ± 0.010 0.954 ± 0.006 0.651 ± 0.007 96.7
each allele descending from each parent and 25% of C 0.581 ± 0.011 0.984 ± 0.007 0.662 ± 0.009 100
probability of each allele being replaced by a new D 0.546 ± 0.016 0.969 ± 0.003 0.631 ± 0.013 100
E 0.471 ± 0.008 0.934 ± 0.006 0.563 ± 0.006 100
random generated value.
F 0.471 ± 0.008 0.968 ± 0.005 0.570 ± 0.007 100
In the previous experiment, extreme values were frequently G 0.544 ± 0.012 0.993 ± 0.003 0.634 ± 0.009 100
found as the best ones. Though it could indicate that additional H 0.578 ± 0.013 0.969 ± 0.009 0.657 ± 0.011 100
investigation would be necessary to extend the set of tested
values, this experimentation is out of the scope of the paper According to Table V, in all the runs, almost all pipes and
and will be considered in a future work. weld beads were correctly detected in the testing radiographs.
 Figures 8, 9 and 10 illustrate a simple, an intermediate and
a hard case, respectively, extracted from the runs conducted
in the testing phase. Figure 10 shows that even in a hard case
the weld bead was successfully detected.
Fig. 8. A simple case: pipe and weld bead correctly extracted from the
testing image H.
Fig. 9. A middle case: pipe and weld bead correctly extracted from the
testing image B.
Fig. 10. A hard case: pipe and weld bead correctly extracted from the testing
image E.
As discussed in the introduction, the proposed approach was
not compared with other similar approaches as the problem of
detecting weld bead in Double Wall Double Image (DWDI)
radiographs has not yet been previously addressed.
VII. C ONCLUSIONS
A GA-based approach for detecting pipe and weld beads
from Double Wall Double Images (DWDI) digital radiographic
images was proposed and tested. An exhaustive grid search
was used to define the GA operational parameters providing
the optimal among all the tested configurations. Pipes and weld
beads were successfully detected in all the 16 (DWDI) X-ray
images considered in the experiments performed to set the
GA parameters and evaluate the approach performance. The
use of synthetic model images provided additional flexibility
to the technique allowing the application to different weld
bead geometries. Small yet efficient sampling grids allowed
a reduced number of pixels to be sampled for each matching
process, thus improving the whole detection process. This
work is part of a project in which the automatic detection of
flaws in weld joint radiographs is the final goal. Considering
the preliminary results obtained in the adopted test bed (which
encompasses radiographs taken from real cases) a future work
could focus on the use of other optimization approaches
like particle swarm optimization that associated with image
processing techniques can provide efficient flaws detection.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This work is partially supported by the Brazilian Na-
tional Research Council (CNPq), under research grants nos.
304867/2008-0 to T.M.Centeno and 307735/2008-7 to M.R.
Delgado, and by Leopoldo Américo Miguez de Mello R&D
Center - CENPES, Brazilian Petroleum - PETROBRAS.
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