Since 1999, Leeds Forensic Systems, Inc. has been designing, manufacturing and distributing forensic laboratory equipment including comparison microscopes and imaging tools to enhance the screening capabilities in forensic labs throughout the United States and around the world. Leeds has been established in the forensic industry as a leader of high-quality, high-performance, superior products supported by exceptional service.
Introducing the next generation digital ALS system, the LSV2 Leeds Spectral Vision System. Building on the strengths of the first generation LSV, the easy-to-use LSV2, with its highly sensitive camera, offers enormous versatility in screening evidence with its high field of view and working distance variability. The LSV2 is a multi-wavelength imaging tool allowing examiners to view all sizes of evidence, including over-sized, within the forensic laboratory.
To highlight the LSV2’s capabilities:
- Highly sensitive, fast, and high resolution camera – The LSV2 is designed with a scientific CCD sensor which is more sensitive to light than the human eye, and by using a CCD sensor, as oppose to a CMOS sensor, provides brilliant images with very little background noise. Leeds performed an exhaustive search and development of a camera that would provide both the sensitivity, resolution, and speed combinations. Because the LSV2 is designed as a screening tool, the camera operates at full resolution with a speed up to 40 frames per second to allow real-time, highly detailed screening without a loss of picture resolution. The LSV2 system meets SWGFAST and SWGIT digital imaging requirements with a field of view of 1.75 inches or less.
- Large Variable Field of View and working distance– The LSV2 is designed with motorized parfocal zoom optics and a motorized series of chromatically corrected close-up lenses. This, paired with the high sensitivity of the system’s camera, allows the LSV2 to capture white light, near infrared, and fluorescence, in crisp, clean, focused images with a field of view as small as 1 inch to a field of view greater than 26 inches (without the use of wide-angle lenses, which can cause a “fish-bowl” effect distortion). The LSV2 has a reach of up to 6 feet allowing coverage of the majority of evidence tables. This variable field of view provides the ability to easily screen and photo-document both overall images as well as close detailed inspections. A standard magnifier ALS light source with a fixed diopter will generally have a limited working distance and is not capable of screening or documenting over such a range of field of view or with the detail that the LSV2 is capable of.
The LSV2 captures images of the same white t-shirt under various fluorescence lighting and filter combinations - Repeatability of exact observation and presets for ease of use – Every image taken with the LSV2 system has metadata linked to the image which details exactly how the image was captured (wavelength of light, filter, even the motorized lens controls) and is displayed in the software and exported picture formats. At any point in time, a previously captured Leeds Vision picture can be opened in the software and the metadata can be re-applied, allowing a forensic scientist to immediately start screening again at the exact settings that were used to capture the previous picture (including magnification). Additionally, the LSV2 system has programmable presets, which allows an analyst to easily choose and then program settings such as “semen stain jeans” or “Blood stains black shirt”. At the touch of a preset button, the LSV2 will change to the selected light/filter and motorize lens position, allowing the ability to rapidly and easily change lighting and observations techniques.
The LSV2 Touch screen showing Leeds Vision software preset options - Fanless system – The LSV2 is a fanless system; which prevents dust from building up in the imaging head as well as preventing the risk of contamination of trace evidence.
Applications of the LSV2 include screening evidence for blood spatter, fibers, gunshot residue, accelerants, bodily fluids, victim bruising and bite marks. For further information or to schedule a demonstration, please contact Leeds or call 1-800-444-5333.