Appendix -1

Proceedings of 57th Joint Technological Conference by ATIRA, BTRA, SITRA & NITRA,
BTRA Mumbai, 17 & 18th Feb 2017

Development of Electronic Drape meter based on

Image Analysis Technique

Arindam Basu, Sanjeev Shukla, Krishan Dewan & Paurush Godhar

Northern India Textile Research Association, Ghaziabad
Introduction :

Drape is the fabric’s ability to deform in space when bent under its own weight.
Fabric drape is one of the properties which influence the aesthetic appearance
of a fabric and has an outstanding effect on the formal beauty of the cloth. In
1930, Pierce found that draping quality of a fabric had a significant influence
on the bending length (1,2,3) Chu et al Developed the standard F.R.L. Drape
meter for the measurement of three dimensional drape (4,5). Cusick introduced
a simple method to calculate the drape coefficient, and found that it depends
both on shear stiffness and bending length (6). Chu et al (4, 5) quantified the
drapability of a fabric into a dimensionless value called “drape coefficient”,
which is defined as the percentage of the area from an angular ring of fabric
covered by a vertical projection of the draped fabric. Cusick (6) investigated the
experimental method again by using a parallel light source that reflects the
drape shadow of a circular specimen from hanging disc into a piece of ring
paper to calculate drape coefficient. Most of the standards today are based on
this method of testing.

All these methods have several disadvantages, such as time consuming

method, tracing the pattern by hand is highly dependent on the skill of the
operator, the light source needed is of special type, the mass variation in the
paper or presence of wrinkle after wet treatment may cause error in the
calculation of drape co-efficient.

A number of scientists (3, 7, 8, 9, 10) used image analysis technique to

measure the drape coefficient. Also they measured static & dynamic drape
coefficient and other drape related properties. Though there are several studies
to prove that image analysis method is more accurate, commercial machines
for the same is not available. As per the information gathered through internet
a few Chinese companies are offering this instrument. These are expensive
and are not so reliable. Hence a project has been undertaken to develop a
commercial electronic drape tester working on the principle of image analysis
technique.

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Experimental:

Design of Instrument

To measure the drapability of fabric using image analysis technique an

instrument has been developed based on the basic idea of Cusick’s Drape
meter. A camera has been placed above to grab the picture and it is linked to
image acquisition system and processing system.

Electronic drape meter comprises a Cusick’s drape meter, a monochromatic

camera and an image processing software. For best image reproduction and
external light control the camera and drape meter are enclosed in a box. Hence,
uniform image enhancement algorithm can be applied for enhancing the
captured images of draped sample.

Camera

Camera
Height
Adjustment
Manual
Trigger

Cusick’s
Drape Meter

Fig-1: Electronic Drape Meter

This instrument is capable of testing fabric sample of 24 centimeters to 30

centimeters in diameter supported on a disk of 18 centimeters. In this
instrument, we have developed the mechanism for measurement of two major
properties of fabric drapability i.e. ‘Drape Coefficient’ by measuring the area of
projection of draped sample and number of nodes developed due to draping of
circular sample.

LabView® platform is used for calculation of drape coefficient and number of

nodes.

Drape coefficient is calculated by the following formula:

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 𝐴𝑟𝑒𝑎 𝑢𝑛𝑑𝑒𝑟 𝑑𝑟𝑎𝑝𝑒𝑑 𝑠𝑎𝑚𝑝𝑙𝑒 − 𝐴𝑟𝑒𝑎 𝑜𝑓 𝑠𝑢𝑝𝑝𝑜𝑟𝑡 𝑑𝑖𝑠𝑘
𝐹 =
𝐴𝑟𝑒𝑎 𝑜𝑓 𝑠𝑎𝑚𝑝𝑙𝑒 − 𝐴𝑟𝑒𝑎 𝑜𝑓 𝑠𝑢𝑝𝑝𝑜𝑟𝑡 𝑑𝑖𝑠𝑘
Method

In electronic drape meter, the sample is placed over the supporting disk and
the process of sample mounting is identical to the conventional Cusick’s Drape
meter. A manual trigger is provided, on the enclosure, for image capturing and
processing (Fig-1).

Once the image is captured successfully, the value of drape coefficient and
number of nodes formed due to draping of sample are calculated and displayed
in the software (Fig-2).

Fig-2: Software GUI

The output can be saved and exported in excel, pdf or text format.

Initially, the captured image is transferred to computer followed by

automatically identifying the center of support disk and drawing circle of 30
centimeters diameter from the center. The portion of image inside the circle is
processed further and the extraneous part is cropped out. Next step is to
enhance the image by adjusting brightness, contrast, sharpness and highlights
levels. External light control and automatic cropping allow the use of uniform
image enhancement algorithms and hence provides better repeatability.

Boundaries of image of draped sample are automatically traced and pixel

values are calculated. Drape coefficient is calculated by the following formula:

(𝑃𝑖𝑥𝑒𝑙𝑠 𝑜𝑓 𝑑𝑟𝑎𝑝𝑒𝑑 𝑠𝑎𝑚𝑝𝑙𝑒 ÷ 𝑃𝑖𝑥𝑒𝑙 𝐷𝑒𝑛𝑠𝑖𝑡𝑦) − 𝐴𝑟𝑒𝑎 𝑜𝑓 𝑆𝑢𝑝𝑝𝑜𝑟𝑡 𝐷𝑖𝑠𝑘

𝐷𝐶 (%) = [ ] ×100
𝐴𝑟𝑒𝑎 𝑜𝑓 𝑠𝑎𝑚𝑝𝑙𝑒 − 𝐴𝑟𝑒𝑎 𝑜𝑓 𝑆𝑢𝑝𝑝𝑜𝑟𝑡 𝑑𝑖𝑠𝑘

An user-friendly and intuitive calibration mechanism is provided in the

instrument. Image of supporting disk, without placing the sample, is captured

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and area is measured. The measured area of the disk is compared with the
calculated value and pixel density is calculated/adjusted.

Start

Capture image without placing sample over the

disk

Calculate the area of disk and compare with known

value

Compare measured area of Measured Area = Calculated Area

disk with calculated area

Measured Area != Calculated Area

Change the value of multiplication factor

Place Sample over the disk

Capturing Image of sample

Calculating Area of sample and no. of nodes

Calculating Drape Coefficient

Report Generation

Fig-3: Flow chart of measurement of drape coefficient & no. of nodes

The number of nodes of draped fabric are calculated by drawing multiple

circular blobs from the center and calculating points of intersection of draped
fabric boundary with each blob. The highest number of intersection points of a
circular blob gives the value of ‘number of nodes’. Circular blobs are places in
such an arrangement that ‘number of nodes’ can be measured for sample
diameter of 24 centimeters to 30 centimeters.

The initial calibration of the instrument is being carried out by conducting

inter-laboratory tests of three fabric samples with variable gsm and drape
values with eight NABL accredited laboratories and using those results for
calibration (to avoid any biasness).

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Conclusions:

An electronic fabric drape tester has been developed which will remove human
bias and reduce the testing time drastically. The results will be very much
useful for the fabric processors, garment and home textile manufacturers and
commercial testing laboratories.

Acknowledgement:

The authors are thankful to the Department of Science and Technology,

Ministry of Science and Technology, Government of India for kindly sponsoring
the project. They are thankful to the Asian Test Equipments for partnering with
NITRA for this project.

References:

1. Pierce F.T. (1930), The Handle of Cloth as a measurable quantity, Jour,

of the Textile Institute, 21(9),377-416
2. Pierce F.T.(1937), The Geometry of Cloth Structure, Jour. Of the Textile
Institute, 28(3),45-97
3. Behera B.K. & Pattanayak A.K. (2006-8), Measurement and Modeling of
drape using digital image processing, Indian Jour. Of fibre & Textile
Res.33(3),230-238
4. Chu C.C., Cummings C.L. & Teixeira N.A. (1950), Mechanics of Elastic
performance of Textile Materials, Part V-A study of the factors affecting
the drape of fabrics, the development of a drape meter, Textile Res.
Jour.20(8), 539-548
5. Chu C.C., Platt M.M. & Hambuyer W.J., (1960), Investigation of the
factors affecting the drapability of fabric, Textile Res. Jour, 30(1),66-67.
6. Cusick Q.E. (1968), the measurement of fabric drape, Jour. Of the Textile
Institute, 59(6)253-260
7. Shyr T.W., Wang P.N. & Cheng K.B (2007), A comparison of the key
parameters affecting the dynamic & static drape coefficients of natural
fibre woven of fabrics by a newly devised dynamic drape automatic
measuring system.
8. Park C.K., Sung M.K. & Woong R.Y., (2004) Quantitative fabric drape
evaluation system using image processing technology, T. Test. Eval.
32(2), 131-137.

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 9. Kenkare, N.& May–Plumbe, T., (2005), Fabric Drape measurement: A
modified method using digital image processing, J. Textile Apparel
Technology Management 4(3), 1-8
10. Robson D and Long C.C. (2000), Drape analysis using image analysis,
clothing Textile Res. J. 18(1), 1-8.

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