Patent ID: 8050486

Claim:
A method for identifying a feature of a workpiece, the method comprising: acquiring two-dimensional data of at least a region of a workpiece; acquiring three-dimensional data of a portion of the region of the workpiece; determining an estimated location of an attribute of a feature of the workpiece from the three-dimensional data; and identifying the feature by analyzing the two-dimensional data in an area surrounding the estimated location of the attribute, wherein identifying the feature includes performing a plurality of iterations of analyzing the two-dimensional data, wherein a first iteration analyzes the two-dimensional data in a first area bounded along a first dimension with a first lineal measurement and a second dimension with a second lineal measurement, and wherein a second iteration analyzes the two-dimensional data in a second area bounded along the first dimension with a third lineal measurement that is longer than the first lineal measurement and the second dimension having a fourth lineal measurement that is shorter than the second lineal measurement.