Apparatus and method for analysing the composition of crop in a crop-conveying machine

Apparatus for analysing the composition of crop in a crop-conveying machine, the apparatus comprising:

• a conveyor for conveying crop in the machine, the conveyor comprising a portion defining a crop movement path;
• a light source that illuminates crop in the crop movement path;
• a camera that captures sequential images of crop in the crop movement path;
• a control device;
• and
• a processing device all operatively connected together, at least one of the intensity and the colour of light output by the light source being adjustable in dependence on at least one control command generated by the control device and determined by optical characteristics generated by the processing device of at least one prior image captured by the camera, wherein the processing device is configured for measuring the reflectance of each element of the image at least two wavelengths and carrying out at least one of an addition, a subtraction, a multiplication, and a division of the measured reflectance values of each image element for better discrimination between crop components, wherein the apparatus further comprises a reference member, the colour properties of which are known, located in or adjacent the crop movement path so as to appear in the images captured by the camera, the processor being capable of assessing the colour characteristics of the reference member and in dependence thereon generating the aforesaid control commands.