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Discriminating Dyes in Soil with Color Image Analysis
Author(s) -
Ewing R. P.,
Horton R.
Publication year - 1999
Publication title -
soil science society of america journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.836
H-Index - 168
eISSN - 1435-0661
pISSN - 0361-5995
DOI - 10.2136/sssaj1999.03615995006300010004x
Subject(s) - scanner , qualitative analysis , color difference , chemistry , environmental science , computer science , materials science , computer vision , artificial intelligence , qualitative research , social science , filter (signal processing) , sociology
Dyes are useful tools for revealing flow patterns, but because analysis of dyes is time‐consuming and often only qualitative, soil scientists have not used them to their full advantage. We developed a method for discriminating dyed from undyed soil in the field and for determining the dye concentration from point to point. The method requires a 35‐mm camera, a specially constructed camera stand for uniform illumination during field work, and a color scanner. Working with Brilliant Blue FCF dye on a gray (chroma of one) soil, we determined dye concentrations <2.0 g L ‐1 with an r 2 of 0.85 and a median absolute error of 0.17 g L ‐1 . At concentrations >2.0 g L ‐1 , analysis was more problematic due to dye precipitating out of solution onto the soil surface, but we obtained an r 2 of 0.70. Use of this method allows convenient and rapid quantitative analysis of dye concentration and other color contrast patterns.