8. Conclusions

Digital processing techniques applied to interferometric measurements allow to obtain the phase from fringe patterns. The fringe analysis methods described here can be used to recover the phase that is associated with the physical variable under study. Under controlled conditions, phase-shifting techniques are the most used methods to retrieve the wrapped phase. If experimental conditions suffer from vibrations, air turbulences or the object changes dynamically, among other factors, then a Fourier method may be preferable to analyze an open-fringe interferogram. Those procedures deliver a wrapped phase. Then, an unwrapping algorithm is needed to reconstruct a continuous phase related with the object being studied. The aim of this chapter is to present, to the reader, the fundamentals of principal fringe analysis techniques. Numerical simulations are provided, in such way that the reader can reproduce them by its own. The extension of the chapter is insufficient to introduce many important techniques. However, the methods presented here were described as clearly and briefly as we could. We hope that the reader finds this information useful in the interpretation of interferograms obtained in the study of some object or phenomena by using an interferometric setup.
