Abstract: An apparatus for measuring gobs of viscous liquid in free fall from a gob feeder includes a video camera for capturing a complete two dimensional, frozen video image of a plurality of gobs positioned substantially side by side at a point in time during free fall. The frozen image is acquired via a single operation of the camera. A digitizer is provided for digitizing the video image to produce a first digitized image of at least a first gob of the plurality of gobs with n x n pixel arrays for comparison with a second digitized image of a second gob with n x n pixel arrays. An image analyzer is provided for analyzing at least the first digitized image for relatively comparing the first digitized image with the second digitized image for determining any physical differences between the first and second gobs represented by the digitized images.

Abstract: An apparatus for measuring gobs of viscous liquid in free-fall, comprises a video camera adapted to be focused on the path of the gobs so that the gobs fall through the field of view thereof. The video camera is equipped with an electronic shutter for capturing successive two-dimensional, high resolution, frozen video images of the path of the gobs; a digitizer for digitizing the successive images to produce n.times.n pixel arrays; and an image analyzer for identifying usable gobs in the arrays and analyzing the image in the vicinity of said gobs on a line-by-line basis to locate the edges thereof.

Abstract: A method of determining the flow rate of a viscous fluid stream comprises passing the fluid stream through a field of view of an electronic imaging device, which produces output signals representing images of the fluid stream at successive times t.sub.0, t.sub.1, . . . t.sub.n. Signals representing an image of the fluid stream at a first time t.sub.i are stored in a first memory, while signals representing an image of the fluid stream at a second time t.sub.j, are stored in a second memory. The time t.sub.j -t.sub.i is less than the time taken for a point on the fluid stream to cross the field of view of the imaging device. The stored signals are then analyzed to derive width signals W(y) representing the width of the fluid stream as a function of y, where y represents a coordinate in the direction of fluid flow, and the first and second stored signals are compared to identify a common point on the fluid stream in the respective images represented thereby.