Determining Percentage of Broken Rice by Using Image Analysis

During the rice milling process, a huller system is used to remove rough rice hull, then abrasive or frictional mill product whitened rice. In such machines adjustment and control, operation is important, because breakage percentage of rice is one main factor in determination of quality. Today’s image processing techniques has become an increasingly popular and cost-effective method. The estimation of rice quality by image processing as a tool to determine broken percentage is the aim of this study. The images were acquired by a digital camera (1944 x 2592 pixels) from grains spread on corrugated plate, and then analyzed by scion software. Statistical analysis showed a significant correlation (greater than 0.9) between the results obtained from the proposed method and conventional method. This work indicates that the digital processing technique can be used for estimating broken grains.