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| Number | Title | Issue Date |
| 8072521 | Solid-state imaging device, method for driving solid-state imaging device and imaging apparatus A solid state imaging device with pixels in a two-dimensional array, a controller which performs window cutting on signals read out of the pixel array in multiple column units on a column-address basis, and a selector which, when the cutting window overlaps with a m... | 12/06/2011 |
| 7679663 | Photodetection apparatus A pixel section Pm,n includes a photodiode PD, a first capacitance section C1, a second capacitance section C2, and transistors T1-T6. The transistor T1 transfers the electric charge generated by the ... | 03/16/2010 |
| 7375750 | Solid-state image capturing device, smear charge removing method and digital still camera using the same In a solid-state image capturing device including a pixel array arranged in a row direction and a column direction orthogonal thereto, and a vertical register having a plurality of transfer electrodes which serves to read signal charges Qa, Qb, . . . generated by li... | 05/20/2008 |
| 7326958 | Solid state imaging device A solid state imaging device includes: a plurality of photoelectric conversion elements which are arranged in a two-dimensional matrix on a semiconductor chip; vertical transfer registers including a vertical transfer channel and vertical transfer electrodes, respec... | 02/05/2008 |
| 7317488 | Method of and system for autofocus An image of a subject is taken by a solid image taking device including a first image taking element having a plurality of pixels and a second image taking element having a plurality of pixels smaller than those of the first image taking element. First and second ev... | 01/08/2008 |
| 7312823 | Solid-state image pick-up apparatus and video camera loaded with the apparatus A solid-state image pick-up apparatus that is capable of suppressing luminance flicker and chroma flicker occurring under a florescent lamp. The apparatus has a CCD solid-state image pick-up device. The image pick-up device further includes an accumulation region th... | 12/25/2007 |
| 7301571 | Method and imaging apparatus for correcting defective pixel of solid-state image sensor, and method for creating pixel information In a solid-state image sensor in which a large number of pixel cells each comprised of a combination of a main photosensitive pixel having a relatively large area and a subsidiary photosensitive pixel having a relatively small area are arranged, if the subsidiary ph... | 11/27/2007 |
| 7295238 | Image signal processing device of image sensor An image-signal processing apparatus (1) designed to process the signals output from a CCD image sensor (10) that reads pixel data for one screen, line by line, divides the pixel data into a plurality of channels and outputs the pixel data thus divided... | 11/13/2007 |
| 7292277 | Solid-state image pick-up device and digital still camera In a solid-state image pick-up device comprising photoelectric converting devices 3r, 3g and 3b formed at a predetermined array interval in row and column directions on a semiconductor substrate, vertical transfer paths 4... | 11/06/2007 |
| 7274391 | CCD having improved flushing by reducing power consumption and creating a uniform dark field while maintaining low dark current A digital camera includes a CCD operating with accumulation mode clocking for capturing an electronic representation of an image; and two or more clocks operatively and respectively connected to each phase of the two or more phases for initiating flushing of excess ... | 09/25/2007 |
| 7271937 | Method and device for imaging using several exposure times In a method for imaging, a plurality of image sensor elements is used, which generate different output signal values when using different exposure times. For each image sensor element, an image signal value is generated by generating a first output signal value when... | 09/18/2007 |
| 7259780 | Image sensor with designatable read-out range A compact, energy efficient image sensor which enables transfer of images to an external system is made compact in size and low in power consumption comprises an image sensor control circuit 20 which operates to drive a CCD image sensor 4 and stores ho... | 08/21/2007 |
| 7236265 | Image reading apparatus, image forming system, image reading method, and program therefor An image reading apparatus includes an imaging unit which has a plurality of channels and which, for the channels, outputs effective signals output from photo-receiving sections for receiving light from a subject, and optical black signals output from light-shieldin... | 06/26/2007 |
| 7218346 | Method for driving solid-state image pickup device A method to overcome a disadvantage that the signal charges decrease depending upon the storage time in a photo-electric conversion unit of a solid-state image pickup device. At the moment t2 when a prescribed exposure time (t1−t2)... | 05/15/2007 |
| 7209166 | Wide dynamic range operation for CMOS sensor with freeze-frame shutter Wide dynamic range operation is used to write a signal in a freeze-frame pixel into the memory twice, first after short integration and then after long integration. The wide dynamic range operation allows the intra-scene dynamic range of images to be extended by com... | 04/24/2007 |
| 7206451 | Multi-resolution image data management system and method based on tiled wavelet-like transform and distinct bitstreams for distinct groups of bit planes An image process system tiles an image data array, processing the tiles in a predefined order. Each tile of image data is processed by applying a predefined family of transform layers to the tile of image data so as to generate successive sets of transform coefficie... | 04/17/2007 |
| 7205522 | Pixel circuit for image sensor A pixel circuit for an image sensor uses a common reset transistor for resetting both of a photodiode node and a memory node. Respective transfer gates connect the common reset transistor to the photodiode node and to the memory node, and connect photodiode node and... | 04/17/2007 |
| 7190402 | Visual sensor for capturing images with different exposure periods A visual sensor capable of expanding a dynamic range with a little load of processing for arithmetic operations and performing a stable detection not affected by change of conditions such as ON/OFF state of projection of reference light. A multiplying parameter A (A... | 03/13/2007 |
| 7190398 | Image sensor with high dynamic range linear output Designs and operational methods to increase the dynamic range of image sensors and APS devices in particular by achieving more than one integration times for each pixel thereof. An APS system with more than one column-parallel signal chains for readout are described... | 03/13/2007 |
| 7161629 | Electronic camera and method for calculating an exposure amount In an electronic camera, an exposure amount S ( 1/2000 sec.), an exposure amount M ( 1/250 sec.) and an exposure amount L ( 1/30 sec.) are set in vertically synchronous signal timing directly before the fourth frame, the fifth frame, and the sixth frame. In the fram... | 01/09/2007 |
| 7139025 | Active pixel sensor with mixed analog and digital signal integration An active pixel sensor includes mixed analog and digital signal integration on the same substrate. The analog part of the array forms the active pixel sensor, and the digital part of the array does digital integration of the signal. ... | 11/21/2006 |
| 7136101 | Use-controlled exposure method and system with visual feedback A camera is provided with a mechanism for supporting a user-controlled exposure mode in which a user can control the exposure time for the picture. A user first places the camera into the user-controlled exposure mode. Then, a user initiates the picture taking proce... | 11/14/2006 |
| 7105793 | CMOS pixels for ALC and CDS and methods of forming the same Embodiments of the invention provide pixel cells that allow both automatic light control and correlated double sampling operations. The pixel cell includes first and second photo-conversion devices that can be separately read out. For example, the second photo-conve... | 09/12/2006 |
| 7102801 | Pulse-width modulated drivers for light-emitting units of scanning mechanism A scanning mechanism of one embodiment of the invention is disclosed that includes light-emitting units, an integrating detector, and pulse-width modulated (PWM) drivers. Each light-emitting unit can emit colored light corresponding to a color of a color space. The ... | 09/05/2006 |
| 7092021 | Frame shuttering scheme for increased frame rate A frame shutter apparatus comprising a controller for controlling multiple groups of pixels and for reading out values corresponding to the charge collected by different groups of pixels at different times. A method of reading out multiple groups of pixels is provid... | 08/15/2006 |
| 7088395 | Image-capturing apparatus The invention concerns an image-capturing apparatus and an imager. The image-capturing apparatus includes the imager in which a plurality of circuit cells are two-dimensionally aligned, and an electronic charge, photo-electronically converted from a received light a... | 08/08/2006 |
| 7079178 | High dynamic range active pixel CMOS image sensor and data processing system incorporating adaptive pixel reset A high Dynamic Range Active Pixel CMOS image sensor architecture has incorporated therein an adaptive pixel reset. The individual sensor pixels are reset only when accumulated charge, or the integration time exceeds certain predetermined limits. The reset is skipped... | 07/18/2006 |
| 7071983 | System and method for controlling photosensitive charge transfers A system for controlling photosensitive charge transfers utilizes an array of photosensitive elements, a transfer gate, a charge transfer register, and a controller. The transfer gate is coupled to the photosensitive elements, and the charge transfer register is cou... | 07/04/2006 |
| 7057649 | System and method for generating digital data and processing in a memory In a video conferencing system, digital data representing pixels of a selected scene are stored in a Video accumulator Array Memory cells (VAM), each cell having memory with several register structures and having the capability of processing the digital data to faci... | 06/06/2006 |
| 7053954 | Process for regulating the exposure time of a light sensor This invention relates to a process for regulating the exposure time of a light sensor, characterized in that it comprises the following steps: a) setting the exposure time of the sensor to a value selected in a first range of M pr... | 05/30/2006 |
| 7053948 | Solid-state image pickup device with discharge gate operable in an arbitrary timing A solid-state image pickup device has a discharge gate and a discharge drain provided adjacent to a connection of a vertical CCD and a horizontal CCD so that charges accumulated for an arbitrary pixel can be completely depleted. Data can be read at an arbitrary deci... | 05/30/2006 |
| 7050094 | Wide dynamic range operation for CMOS sensor with freeze-frame shutter Wide dynamic range operation is used to write a signal in a freeze-frame pixel into the memory twice, first after short integration and then after long integration. The wide dynamic range operation allows the intra-scene dynamic range of images to be extended by com... | 05/23/2006 |
| 7030923 | Digital camera having overlapped exposure A digital camera includes a shutter button. When taking a still picture of a subject in response to operation of the shutter button, a TG carries out first exposure and second exposure. The first exposure and the second exposure are simultaneously started by the sus... | 04/18/2006 |
| 7019780 | Stereoscopic zoom lens with shutter arranged between first and second lens groups A lens unit and a camera capable of achieving stereoscopic television function and zoom function at the same time. More specifically, a lens unit (2) and a camera (1) each including at least a zoom lens (4), light quantity adjusting device (6... | 03/28/2006 |
| 7008374 | Imaging apparatus which adjusts for dark noise and readout noise An imaging apparatus using a charge multiplying solid-sate imaging device for use with an endoscope system, etc., capable of providing an output signal with an improved S/N ratio by reducing the dark noise. The full well size of the CCD imaging device is reduced to ... | 03/07/2006 |
| 6975355 | Multiple sampling via a time-indexed method to achieve wide dynamic ranges An architecture for a digital pixel sensor is disclosed in which the dynamic range of the sensor is increased by taking samples of a subject to be recorded, where each sample is taken over an interval of a different duration than the other samples. In the preferred ... | 12/13/2005 |
| 6967684 | Solid state image pickup device and its driving method using two different periods A method and apparatus for driving a solid state image pickup device. The method and apparatus include setting a first signal charging period and a second signal charging period for each one of a plurality of unit pixels. The second signal charging period is shorter... | 11/22/2005 |
| 6943838 | Active pixel sensor pixel having a photodetector whose output is coupled to an output transistor gate An imaging device formed as a monolithic complementary metal oxide semiconductor integrated circuit in an industry standard complementary metal oxide semiconductor process, the integrated circuit including a focal plane array of pixel cells, each one of the cells in... | 09/13/2005 |
| 6888969 | Method and apparatus for preventing image artifacts A pixel sensing subsystem (110) for a solid state image sensor includes frame timing logic (114) that produces a frame timing signal indicative of an end-of-frame time and a beginning-of-frame time and reset logic (116) that produces a reset sig... | 05/03/2005 |
| 6888570 | Image pickup device and exposure control method in the image pickup device An image pickup device comprises a CCD solid-state imaging element composed of a charge accumulation section and a charge transfer section, a CCD driver for driving the imaging element, a mechanical shutter for switching between the transmitting state and shading st... | 05/03/2005 |
