A Cross-Correlation Based Accuracy Assessment of Tomographic PIV

Tomographic Particle Image Velocimetry (Tomo-PIV) is a promising new PIV technique capable of producing high-frequency time-resolved full 3D velocity fields. Advantages include: higher possible resolution than Particle Tracking Velocimetry (PTV), a simpler fully digital set-up in comparison with standard Holographic-PIV, and instantaneous flow field capture as opposed to quasi-instantaneous in Scanning-PIV. However, based on previous investigations (Elsinga \textit{et al}. 2005) measurement resolution appears to be somewhat limited, and although higher than PTV is still lower than other 3D techniques. However, this conclusion appears to be largely based on a correlation coefficient based accuracy assessment of artificial and reconstructed objects. Although useful, this measure may not adequately represent the accuracy of the PIV system, which is based on the cross-correlation of reconstructed objects. Therefore, in order to determine setup parameter effects more realistically, the current computational study details a cross-correlation based accuracy analysis of a simple vortical flow-field. A more direct understanding of how setup choices affect PIV results will allow the accuracy and resolution of results to be maximized, through simple parameter selection.