Modal Analysis is the process of characterizing the dynamic properties of an elastic structure by identifying its modes of vibration. A mode of vibration is a global property of an elastic structure. That is, a mode has a specific natural frequency and damping factor which can be identified from response data at practically any point on a structure, and it has a characteristic mode shape which identifies the mode spatially over the entire structure. Modal testing is able to be performed on structural and mechanical structure in an effort to learn more about their elastic behavior. Once the dynamic properties of a structure are known its behavior can be predicted and therefore controlled or corrected. Resonant frequencies, damping factors and mode shape data can be used directly by a mechanical designer to pin point weak spots in a structure design, or this data can also be used to confirm or synthesize equations of motion for the elastic structure. These differential equations can be used to simulate structural response to know input forces and to examine the effects of pertubations in the distributed mass, stiffness and damping properties of the structure in more detail. In this paper the measurement of transfer functions in digital form, and the application of digital parameter identification techniques to identify modal parameters from the measured transfer function data are discussed. It is first shown that the transfer matrix, which is a complete dynamic model of an elastic plate structure can be written in terms of the structural modes of vibration. This special mathematical form allows one to identify the complete dynamics of the structure from a much reduced set of test data, and is the essence of the modal approach to identifying the dynamics of a structure. Finally, the application of transfer function models and identification techniques for obtaining modal parameters from the transfer function data are discussed. Characteristics on vibration response of elastic plate structure obtained from the dynamic analysis by Finite Element Method are compared with results of modal analysis.