On the influence of imaging conditions and algorithms on the quantification of surface topography

The influence of the microscopical magnification resulting in different voxel size and shape and of the algorithm on parameters used for the quantification of the surface topography is studied using topographical images obtained by confocal laser scanning microscopy. Fracture surfaces and wire-eroded surfaces of steel were used as samples. The values obtained for the global topometry parameters normalized surface area, mean profile segment length and fractal dimension depend with different degrees on the microscopic magnification and on the algorithm used to compute these values. The topometry values can only be used to establish correlations between the topography and materials properties and for the modelling of surface generating processes if the imaging and computing details are given.