Intelligent identification method for rock discontinuities properties by digital borehole panoramic images

Digital borehole panoramic imaging technique is the main method to identify the discontinuities properties of deep rock mass. The traditional identification method mainly relies on manual operation, therefore the results are artificial, subjective and inaccurate. A new intelligent identification method is proposed considering gray level distribution of rock discontinuities for the digital borehole panoramic imaging technique. The panoramic images are firstly pre-processed by graying and noise reduction, and positioned the joints by the eigenvalue, D, to obtain the joints region images. The joints images are processed after edge detection, threshold partition and morphology processing. Finally, intelligent identification of discontinuities characteristics are realized by joints edge curve fitting and mathematical calculation, which are dip direction, dip and aperture. Compared with a traditional artificial method, the proposed technique is more accurate and objective, and more efficient in batch images identification.