Journal of Textile Science & Engineering

Evaluation of Light and Color Performances of Deep Black Coloring of Non Circular Cross Section Polyester Fabrics using Polarization Image Processing

Abstract

Xiaosong Liu, Fumei Wang and Ian R Hardin

The light and color performances of deep-black-coloring of fabrics made of Non-Circular Cross-Section (NCCS) Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET) fibers were investigated by means of GP, SEM and polarization imaging. The GP surface reflectance curves showed that the performance of single NCCS fibers were profoundly affected by the forces loaded under horizontal and vertical directions compared to its yarns. The unique surface characteristics of the NCCS PET fabrics indicated by its constituent fibers’ cross-sections and fabrics’ SEM images gave unpredictable effects on the light and color perceived on the deep-coloring effect of the fabrics. Polarization imaging results of black-dyed woven fabrics indicated that higher specular and chroma values affected the deep-coloring effect, and that the overlapping chroma curves means that there were insignificant differences among those black fabrics. Meanwhile the similar results for the knitted fabrics suggested that higher values of chroma means higher effect of deep-coloring compared to undyed/white samples with higher values of specular reflectance and shine. Subjective visual evaluation was carried out on the post-processed polarization images of the NCCS PET woven samples and was compared to the instrumental results. The results revealed that there was good consistency on deep-coloring perceived between the intensity images and average value of chroma while inconsistency occurred between the intensity images and the average value of intensity.