Volume Graphics Launches New AI Training Tool As Hexagon Completes Brand Integration
Volume Graphics GmbH (VG), part of Hexagon, has announced the release of version 2025.1 of its suite of CT analysis software, which includes a new VGTRAINER application. Created for ease of use by non-AI-experts, from R&D through inline-production inspection, the application enables manufacturing companies to take advantage of the latest developments in automation and deep learning to design, develop, and inspect higher-quality products faster.
Parallel to the 2025.1 release, the Volume Graphics brand will now complete its merger with the Hexagon brand, a change five years in the making. Operating under Hexagon’s VG software, the logo and product icons will be refreshed while the well-known product names remain: VGSTUDIO MAX, VGSTUDIO, VGMETROLOGY, VGinLINE, and myVGL. As the de facto standard for non-destructive evaluation of NDE and CT-data analysis, VG software provides clear, reliable insights across all data sources, from CT scans to optical and tactile measurements.
Future VG software releases will increasingly integrate data processing capabilities for other NDT-source data to support customers across the Hexagon Manufacturing Intelligence division, offering broader end-to-end digital solutions for quality inspection and advanced product development and pioneering the future of non-destructive evaluation (NDE).
“This complete integration of VG software into Hexagon’s metrology software portfolio gives engineers and inspection personnel the ability to use computed tomography (CT) to see deeply and non-destructively into their materials—and then benefit from additional product-development tools that support further quality insights and assessment,” says Dr. Daniela Handl, General Manager, VG, Hexagon Manufacturing Intelligence.
“The inclusion of Volume Graphics’ legacy capabilities into the Hexagon eco-system delivers a complete suite of product-development capabilities,” says Handl. “These span design, simulation, testing, material selection, manufacturing-design planning, production, and inspection, through the complete value chain to end-of-life assessments of final product performance.”
Says Hexagon customer Dr. Peter Mikitisin, Founder and Owner of iWP, an accredited materials testing laboratory, “Hexagon’s VGTRAINER offers enhanced AI and machine learning capabilities that enable users to custom-train inspection models of proprietary parts, leading to much faster final inspection processes. There is an up-front time investment in labeling quality data sets, and training models to spot failure modes. But that automation step radically saves manufacturers time on the production line.
“The AI approach quickly and automatically finds designated Regions of Interest (ROIs), segments them correctly, and visualizes results. If normal manual inspection analysis takes one or two minutes, for example, a VG analysis of ROIs will take just three or four seconds. That is a major advancement for concurrently producing and inspecting parts on the production line in real-time.”
Hexagon’s VGSTUDIO MAX 2025.1 is the first step towards training a model. To accurately label and prepare the training data sets, this application can be used to set up ideal segmentation scenarios, labeling only the most important inclusions or regions of interest. From there, VGTRAINER offers:
AI-Assisted Segmentation Models: Using a number (exact amount depending on application/data set complexity) of pre-segmented and labeled training data sets, VGTRAINER produces a machine-learning model that can be imported into VGSTUDIO MAX for subsequent use in accurately segmenting complex or noisy data sets quickly and accurately. This is ideal for cases in which there are hundreds of parts to inspect, or in- and at-line quality assurance scenarios.
Non-Expert Model Training: VGTRAINER is easy enough to use that once a set of labeled data has been prepared by experts, other customer-based engineers can then simply import the training data into VGTRAINER and generate a model automatically, without in-depth AI or machine learning experience. This increases accuracy over time and continuously improves quality inspection models.
Speed in R&D and In-Line Inspection: ELEMCA an independent laboratory in France servicing manufacturing customers across multiple industries recently saw marked time savings when putting this new functionality to work. They fed 8 ideally segmented datasets of four materials, carbon, aluminum, glue, and porosity, into Hexagon’s VGTRAINER to ‘learn’ the skills needed to generate a segmentation model. The manual segmentation, particularly of carbon vs glue, is time consuming as the gray values of both components are very similar. With just 10 datasets, VGTRAINER was able to create a machine-learning model that accurately segments these materials into two separate ROIs, allowing for the subsequent standard porosity detection within VGSTUDIO MAX. This full workflow (VGTRAINER model creation—AI-segmentation in VGSM + standard porosity detection) enabled ELEMCA to reduce time needed from 1 hour to just 10 minutes.
“We anticipate that the time savings of more than 80% that AI is delivering will help us improve customer satisfaction across a broader range of industries as we leverage our evolving capabilities,” says Julien Uzanu, NDT Expert, ELEMCA.
In addition to the new VGTRAINER application, version 2025.1 provides users with a host of other enhanced features that include automatic beam hardening, object-specific views, and 3D reporting.
For more information: volumegraphics.hexagon.com
