A Good Practices Guide for Digital Image Correlation
| Authors: | Amanda Jones, Nathan J. Bechle, Sante DiCecco, Jevan Furmanski, Brian Harmon, Behrad Koohbor, Florent Mathieu, Benoît Blaysat, Michel Coret, François Hild, Pascal Lava, Jean-Charles Passieux, Jean-Noël Périé, Julien Réthoré, Nicolas Swiergiel, Zixiang Tong, Jin Yang, Elizabeth Jones [editor], Mark Iadicola [editor] |
| Year: | 2025 |
| Type: | Guidebooks |
| Station: | Forest Products Laboratory |
| DOI: | https://doi.org/10.32720/idics/gpg.ed2 |
| Source: | International Digital Image Correlation Society |
Abstract
The International Digital Image Correlation Society (iDICs) was founded in 2015 as a nonprofit scientific and educational organization committed to training and educating users of digital image correlation (DIC) systems. iDICs is composed of members from academia, government, and industry, and develops world-recognized DIC training and certifications to improve industry practice of DIC for general applications, with emphasis on both research and establishing standards for DIC measurement techniques. More information can be found at www.idics.org.
To support this mission, the iDICs Standardization Committee was formed in part to develop guidelines for DIC practitioners. Details of the entire development and review process can be obtained through iDICs (info@idics.org), but they are summarized here. The working group on Good Practices, Reporting Requirements and Terminology (a subset of the committee) developed this Good Practices Guide for DIC. The working group was composed of expert DIC practitioners (see below), including representatives from many commercial DIC software packages, with diverse experience using DIC in a myriad of applications.
After a final draft of the guide was completed by the working group, a public comment period was opened in November 2017 through January 2018, during which any DIC practitioner could opt-in to review the Guide. In total, 100 people opted-in to the review process, 56 of whom returned official votes. Of the 56 received votes, 23 people voted “Approve without comment”, 32 people voted “Approve with comments and suggested revisions”, and 1 person voted “Disapprove with comments (at least one technical) and suggested revisions”. Over 500 comments were received (over 130 of which were technical comments), and the working group addressed each, either through revising the Guide, or through a written rebuttal. After that revision, the final version of the Guide and the working group responses to the comments were reviewed and approved by some of the members of the iDICs Executive Board, who did not participate in either the working group or the public comment period. Edition 1 of the Guide was officially released in October 2018.
During the public comment period for Edition 1 of the Guide, the Standardization Committee surveyed reviewers for what areas of the Guide needed to be prioritized for future improvement and expansion. Based on these results, the global DIC working group and the Figure-Examples-References working groups were formed. The Standardization Committee continued to collect editorial and technical comments about the entire Guide. Edition 2 of the Guide incorporates these additions and revisions.
Similar to Edition 1, a draft of Edition 2 was first reviewed by the Standardization Committee, and then opened for public comment in November 2022 through January 2023. In total, 59 people opted-in to review process, 40 of whom returned official votes. Of the 40 received votes, 11 people voted “Approve without comment”, and 29 people voted “Approve with comments and suggested revisions”. Over 600 comments were received (over 160 of which were technical comments), and the working groups and editors addressed each comment. The Standardization Committee and iDICs Executive Board reviewed the penultimate version of the Guide, and this final version was released in October 2025.