Characterizing the Transient and Stationary Response of the TAU 2 Camera

Abstract

The purpose of this research is to learn how a FLIR Tau 2 infrared camera reacts to stimuli to, later on, preform a calibration of the camera. This included measuring the line spread function (LSF), quantifying the thermal blooming, looking at the response to thermal changes in the focal plane array (FPA), and measuring the response of different temperature and speed sub-pixel objects streaking across the FPA to backtrack what the actual size, speed, shape and temperature of unknown objects were. This work will provide information to help in performing a calibration on the camera necessary to be able to get performance similar to that of a cooled sensor out of an uncooled sensor. There was not enough time to fully understand the reaction of the camera to different stimuli, which would require much more effort, but there was a large amount of information gathered that can greatly increase the understanding of the camera and help in performing calibration of the camera later on.