In underwater inspections, achieving clear and accurate imagery is crucial. Whether surveying marine infrastructure, mapping seafloor habitats, or inspecting offshore energy assets, the ability to capture fine details directly impacts decision-making and project outcomes. With the launch of Deep Vision Optics, now integrated into the Discovery Vision System and Observer Imaging System, precision and clarity are taken to new depths. But what exactly makes this innovation so impactful? It all comes down to a crucial optical concept: Modulation Transfer Function (MTF).
What is MTF and Why Does It Matter?
The Modulation Transfer Function (MTF) is an essential metric for evaluating a camera’s ability to capture detail. It is a quantitative measure of an imaging system’s sharpness. In other words, it measures how well an optical system can reproduce contrast at different spatial frequencies—the finer the detail, the higher the frequency. A higher MTF value means the camera can capture high contrast with minimal loss, even for intricate features.
In subsea environments, maintaining consistent image quality is challenging due to factors like backscatter, turbidity, and light absorption. Overcoming these limitations requires a well-designed imaging system—with optimal lighting, appropriate spacing, and robust processing—to mitigate environmental impacts. Within this context, high-quality optics play a critical role by enabling sharp, high-contrast imagery that captures both broad structures and fine details, delivering clearer insight into complex underwater scenes.
Why Resolution Isn’t Everything
A common misconception in underwater imaging is that higher resolution alone leads to better image quality. While resolution defines the number of pixels in an image, it does not guarantee clarity or usability. Without the optical precision to maintain contrast and sharpness across those pixels, a high-resolution image may still appear blurry or lack critical detail.
This is where MTF becomes more relevant than resolution alone. A high-MTF system ensures that each pixel carries meaningful, accurate information—delivering real insight instead of just being a larger file size. And it’s not just about sharpness or contrast in the image center. What matters is how well the system performs across the entire image, including edges, corners, and varying focal depths.
The Importance of Detail Across the Entire Image
Many underwater cameras show strong performance in the image center but degrade at the edges, leading to inconsistencies and missed data. Flat viewport cameras are especially bad for maintaining image sharpness across the field of view, and even domed viewport cameras struggle to achieve good sharpness in the corners. Deep Vision Optics proprietary design ensures high MTF-values across the entire image plane, not just the center. That means consistent sharpness and contrast from edge to edge, ensuring that no detail is lost regardless of where it appears in the frame.
In complex offshore inspections—such as riser evaluations, flowline touchdown monitoring, or manifold structure assessments—features of interest may appear at varying depths and angles. That’s why Deep Vision Optics also incorporates an optimized depth of field, enabling the camera to capture both close-up and distant features in sharp focus within a single frame. Combined with Voyis’ high dynamic range sensors, this allows operators to conduct comprehensive, detail-rich inspections without sacrificing accuracy at any point in the field of view.
Optimized Imaging for Underwater Inspections
The Deep Vision Optics system is engineered to meet the exacting demands of subsea inspection. By optimizing image sharpness and depth of field in every region of the image, Deep Vision Optics ensures accurate and detailed visual data even in the most challenging conditions. Unlike conventional underwater cameras, which often suffer from contrast loss at the edges or with fine detail, the Observer Imaging System, Discovery Vision System, and Recon Payloads maintain exceptional resolution and clarity throughout.
This level of optical performance is vital for:
- Subsea structure integrity inspections, such as jacket foundations or manifolds
- Flexible riser and umbilical monitoring, where braided elements or damage may appear off-center
- Pipeline crossings and touchdown monitoring, where consistency across the image field aids in accurate geospatial interpretation
Confidence in Every Pixel
When conducting underwater inspections, missing details due to degraded image quality can lead to uncertainty, safety risks, and costly rework. With Deep Vision Optics, inspectors and survey teams can trust that every pixel in the image contributes to a complete and accurate picture of the subsea environment.
Whether it’s early-stage exploration or late-life asset monitoring, Voyis’ sharpness-optimized optics enable operators to capture critical visual data with clarity and consistency—transforming underwater inspections into reliable, high-confidence assessments.