07.15.2026 –
Naval Surface Warfare Center, Philadelphia Division hosted its first-ever computer vision workshop at the command on July 15, 2026, serving as a kickoff for an expanded effort to make this cutting-edge education available to NSWCPD’s summer workforce and, eventually, to the command as a whole.
The 16 inaugural participants were drawn from the Virtual Cyber and Electromagnetic Spectrum Research and Employ (VICEROY) Program, the Naval Research Enterprise Internship Program (NREIP), and the Science, Mathematics, and Research for Transformation (SMART) Scholarship-for-Service Program. They represented colleges and universities from across the Nation.
Computer vision is a field of artificial intelligence that enables computers to interpret information contained in digital images and video. Depending on the application, a computer vision system can be trained to recognize an object, classify it, determine where it appears in an image, follow its movement, or separate it from the surrounding background.
These capabilities have potential applications across the Department of the Navy, including autonomous systems, inspection, measurement, maintenance, data collection, and the identification of objects or changes that could be difficult or time-consuming to detect manually.
Developed by NSWCPD software engineer Alyssa Antonian and robotic engineer Max Weissman of the command’s Advanced Data Acquisition, Prototyping Technologies, and Virtual Environments (ADAPT.VE) Laboratory, the workshop gives participants a practical introduction to the concepts and tools used to build computer vision applications.
“The goal of the workshop is to teach foundational concepts of computer vision to students and young career professionals who did not have the opportunity to learn these concepts in university or on the job,” Antonian said. “It’s a rapidly growing field with many sub-disciplines that is of growing importance to the defense industry as integration of autonomous systems and 3D pipelines becomes more common place.”
The workshop introduced participants to Python programming and OpenCV, a widely used computer vision library. It also covered image processing, edge detection, feature extraction, and matching, and the use of machine learning models for computer vision.
Rather than presenting the material only through lectures, Antonian and Weissman designed the workshop as a hands-on exercise. Participants used the concepts and tools presented during the session to perform common computer vision operations themselves, including image transformations and the application of common and custom kernels to filter images. The workshop was structured so participants with different levels of programming and artificial intelligence experience could work through the material.
“This approach is important because exposure to computer vision can vary considerably among students and early-career professionals. Some participants may encounter advanced machine learning concepts through their university programs, while others may have little opportunity to study the field despite its growing relevance,” Weissman said.
Participants said the lab-based format helped them connect the underlying concepts to fields they may encounter in school, research, or future Navy work.
“This gives me a different look at how artificial intelligence and learning models intake pictures and produce the output. This workshop and labs give me an opportunity to see how it might be used in the future to help detect possible mechanical failures,” said Gustian Bici, a sophomore in Penn State’s materials science and engineering program and an NREIP participant.
“This is an emerging technology that continues to advance at a rapid pace, so this is an opportunity to learn how the Navy uses it,” said Jonathan Miller, a Master of Engineering student at Cornell University and a SMART scholar.
“The workshop provided an initial grounding in the machine learning behind computer vision. My plan is to enroll in graduate courses in the field when I return to campus. Doing hands-on labs and workshops with real-world implications is one of the benefits of the SMART program,” said Lurvens Joseph, a first-year master’s student in electrical engineering at the New Jersey Institute of Technology and a SMART scholar.
The three programs represented at the workshop provide students with different pathways to defense-related education, research, and workforce experience.
NREIP is a 10-week internship program that gives undergraduate and graduate students opportunities to conduct research under the guidance of a research mentor at a participating Navy laboratory.
The SMART Scholarship-for-Service Program is a combined educational and workforce development opportunity for students pursuing science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) degrees. It offers scholarships for undergraduate, master’s, and doctoral students across 24 STEM disciplines and is the largest education and workforce development initiative under the Department of War (DoW) STEM Program.
VICEROY is a national effort to build the next generation of professionals advancing research and operations in cybersecurity, the electromagnetic spectrum, and other areas critical to U.S. defense and national security. VICEROY scholars participate in academic programs aligned with U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) standards, cyber-spectrum co-curricular clubs, defense-relevant competitions based on real-world DoW mission scenarios and challenges, and applied learning experiences designed to build technical expertise and connect them with defense missions and leaders.
The July 15 event grew out of an educational program originally developed through NSWCPD’s STEM program with support from the Naval STEM Office. Antonian and Weissman previously delivered versions of the workshop to students participating in the Cybersecurity Sprint, conducted in collaboration with Naval Information Warfare Center Pacific and the University City Science Center’s FirstHand Program, as well as members of Temple University’s Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers student chapter.
Those earlier sessions helped the developers refine the curriculum before offering it at NSWCPD.
Computer vision is also closely connected to technical efforts already underway at NSWCPD. The ADAPT.VE Laboratory uses and develops computer vision applications related to metrology and intelligent autonomous systems.
Metrology is the science of measurement. Computer vision can support metrology by allowing engineers to extract measurements from images, identify differences between components, or assist with inspection and verification. Within intelligent autonomous systems, visual data can help a system recognize its surroundings and make decisions based on what its sensors detect.
“These applications demonstrate why computer vision literacy is becoming increasingly valuable to the Navy’s scientific and engineering workforce. Along with learning about novel tools in a rapidly growing field, developing this knowledge gives both students and employees the foundational knowledge to apply computer vision techniques to solving Navy problems,” Weissman said.
For Antonian and Weissman, the workshop is not only an introduction to a rapidly evolving technology. It is also a way to give students and early-career professionals the foundation needed to explore how artificial intelligence, machine learning, and visual data can help solve future Navy problems.
NSWCPD employs approximately 2,700 civilian engineers, scientists, technicians, and support staff. The team focuses on research and development, testing and evaluation, acquisition support, and in-service and logistics engineering for non-nuclear machinery, ship machinery systems, and related equipment and materials for Navy surface ships and submarines. NSWCPD also serves as the primary organization responsible for cybersecurity across all ship systems.