Portable plant health analysis system and method

A portable apparatus for analyzing a plant specimen, the apparatus comprising:

• a housing assembly adapted to be carried between locations by a person, the housing assembly having a closed configuration wherein the housing assembly defines a sensing volume, the housing assembly controlling entry of ambient light into the sensing volume when in the closed configuration;
• at least one light emitter supported by the housing and positioned to emit light within the sensing volume when the housing is in a closed configuration;
• a specimen support coupled with the housing wherein the specimen support positions the plant specimen within the sensing volume whereby light emitted from the at least one light emitter is incident upon the plant specimen when the housing is in a closed configuration;
• an image sensor positioned to sense light within the sensing volume that has been emitted from the at least one light emitter and incident on the plant specimen;
• and
• a processor operably coupled with the at least one light emitter and the image sensor to control operation of the apparatus whereby image data captured by the image sensor is obtained to assess one or more properties of the plant specimen,
• wherein the light emitted from the at least one light emitter and incident on the plant specimen that is sensed by image sensor defines an optical path from the light emitter to the image sensor, wherein the apparatus includes a plurality of optical components interacting with the light defining the optical path and wherein the at least one light emitter and the image sensor each define one of the plurality of optical components,
• wherein a plant specimen engaged by the specimen support is movable relative to at least one of the plurality of optical components in the optical path, and
• wherein the image sensor is adapted to acquire images under a plurality of different lighting conditions and wherein the apparatus is configured to move the plant specimen relative to at least one of the plurality of optical components in the optical path to thereby define a plurality of different regions of interest viewable by the image sensor on the plant specimen and wherein the apparatus is configured to acquire, at each region of interest, a plurality of images wherein each of the plurality of images is subject to different lighting conditions.