1. A method for evaluating optical distortion in a transparency, the method comprising: obtaining an electronic reference image comprising a digital image of a structure having a plurality of visible index locations, the entire electronic reference image being obtained simultaneously from a fixed imaging location relative to the structure, said electronic reference image obtained at a first time without a transparency under test comprising said image; obtaining an electronic test image comprising a digital image of the structure, the entire electronic test image being obtained simultaneously from the fixed imaging location and through said transparency under test, said electronic reference test obtained at a second time different from said first time; computing displacement characteristics for the visible index locations, the displacement characteristics being based upon reference positions of the visible index locations captured in the electronic reference image and corresponding test positions of the visible index locations captured in the electronic test image, said computing comprising calculating a relative x-axis displacement g x and y-axis displacement g y of a respective test position as a function of the determinant curl elements; said computing by a computing device, said computing device comprising processing logic and/or processing instructions residing in computer readable media; and generating optical distortion measurement data for the transparency under test, the optical distortion measurement data being based upon the displacement characteristics, said generating by a computing device, said computing device comprising processing logic and/or processing instructions residing in computer readable media.