The Role Of Macro Photography In Failure Analysis

Any item built eventually fails. The goal of engineering is not to create items that never break, but rather to create items that last as long as possible, or at least break with some predictability. Understanding why items from computer chips to airplane wings fail allows engineers to design more reliable products in the future. The detail available from macro photography is an essential tool in failure analysis.

Understanding Failure

Every engineering student studies failure. From major catastrophes like bridge collapses to smaller disasters such as car crashes, understanding the physical forces involved and the design mistakes made produces better engineers. Even practicing engineers continue to study failure, particularly their own, to avoid making the same mistakes in the future.

The only way to understand failure is to have comprehensive documentation, and an essential part of that documentation is photographs. Humans are visual, and we often need to see to believe. Showing a failed part in extreme detail helps engineers understand concepts such as shearing force and metal fatigue at a fundamental level. They see how even the smallest part can have massive effects, and how a single failed bolt can cause an airplane to crash.

Macro Photography

One of the many advantages of photographs over the actual part is pictures can be examined by countless people simultaneously. Digital images last forever if they are backed up, and can be examined even if the original item has been rebuilt or destroyed.

However the images must be as detailed as possible. Tiny details might end up being key elements of understanding the reasons for part failure. Macro photography allows even microscopic details to be reproduced with accuracy and precision. These features may be an essential part of the initial investigation of the reason for the failure, or a valuable lesson for other engineers studying the piece. In failure analysis, it's better to have too much information than too little, too much detail than too little.

Future Analysis And Education

Long after the original failure, the information is still valuable. As mentioned, past breakdowns are often used to educate new generations of engineers and technicians. Seeing the damage in the vivid detail available with macro photography demonstrates the forces at work, and shows how a tiny spot of metal fatigue can lead to catastrophic results.

New technology and understanding of the physical processes involved allows additional insight into a failure years or decades later. Engineers have used photographs of past disasters to develop computer models that make today's structures, vehicles and other items safer than ever. Investigators with different perspectives have overturned the results previous investigations, discovering the real reasons for crashes or collapses.

Failure analysis is too important to be documented in an amateur manner, and many firms choose to use macro photography experts to ensure the pictures generated are the most detailed and precise images possible.


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