Sony Corporation

Nec Corporation

Koichi Yoshikawa

Shigeru Tajima

Etsuro Saito

Noriyuki Yamashita

Yoshio Ozaki

Toshiyuki Shirasu

There is provided an image processing apparatus including an image acquisition unit that obtains color image data composed of wavelength components in a visible light region only, and monochrome image data which does not contain the wavelength components in the visible light region and which is composed of wavelength components in other than visible light region only, a color information extraction unit that extracts color information from the color image data, a luminance information extraction unit that extracts luminance information from the monochrome image data, and a synthesis unit that synthesizes the extracted color information and the extracted luminance information to generate composite image data.

Image processing apparatus, image processing method, and program to create a composite image from color image data and monochrome image data

Provided is an optical apparatus including a filter () that includes a first surface () intersecting a rotation axis at a predetermined angle and a second surface () orthogonal to the rotation axis and rotates around the rotation axis, a filter () that is arranged adjacent to the filter (), includes a third surface () and a fourth surface () in a spatial relationship of point-symmetry to the first surface () and the second surface () about a point on the rotation axis between the filters, and rotates in an opposite direction of the filter () around the rotation axis.

Optical apparatus and imaging apparatus

There is provided an imaging apparatus including an optical elements that disperses an incoming light from a subject into a first light composed of wavelength components in a visible light region only, and a second light which does not contain the first light and which is composed of wavelength components in other than visible light region only, a color image pickup device that receives the first light irradiated from the optical element, and a monochrome image pickup device that receives the second light irradiated from the optical element.

Imaging apparatus comprising color image pickup device and monochrome image pickup device

An imaging apparatus includes an imaging device, and an optical system configured to image light from an imaging subject on the imaging device. The optical system includes a group of lenses and an aperture diaphragm. When NP point is defined as a point where an extended linear component in an object space of a principal ray located in a Gauss region and selected from among principal rays passing through a center of the aperture diaphragm of the optical system crosses an optical axis of the optical system, D represents a diameter of a lens at the closest side to the imaging subject, and LN represents a distance from a lens surface of the lens at the closest side to the imaging subject to the NP point, a formula; 0&#x2266;LN&#x2266;D (1) is satisfied.

Imaging apparatus

An imaging device includes imagers each having an imaging element. An NP point is located downstream of the imaging element, and all NP points are collectively located within a predetermined radius region centered on one of the NP points. A lens closest to the object is cut along a plane not including the optical axis, and a&#x3e;H is satisfied, where H is a distance from the optical axis to a center portion of an overlapping region with the adjacent imager when the imaging element is scanned from the optical axis toward the optical axis of the adjacent imager, and a is a distance from the optical axis to a position at which an illuminance ratio does not vary even if an aperture stop state is shifted, although the position is located in a region in which the illuminance ratio decreases as the distance from the optical axis increases.

Imaging device

An image pickup device which can obtain an image of wide range picked up by a plurality of cameras is provided by preventing occurrence of parallax.

Image pickup device

An image pickup apparatus is able to shoot an image of a wide range by a plurality of image pickup units, it is able to obtain excellent image quality and it can be miniaturized. An image pickup apparatuscomprises a plurality of image pickup unitsincluding an image pickup deviceand a front lens, the adjacent image pickup unitsbeing located in such a manner that image pickup areas overlap each other and the image pickup units being located so as to satisfy a conditional equation AL&#x3c;fD (1) where a cross-section passing a viewpoint center, an image pickup deviceand a front lensis created in the direction in which the image areas of the adjacent image pickup portions overlap with each other, a cross-section length of the image pickup deviceis assumed to be A, a cross-section length of the front lensis assumed to be D, a length from the front lensto the image pickup deviceis assumed to be L and a focal length which results from synthesizing the whole of the lenses within the image pickup unitcontaining the front lensis assumed to be f and that the viewpoint center of each image pickup unitmay lie within a sphere with a diameter of 20 mm.

A 360&#xb0;-image is formed on the object-side surface (doughnut-shaped)of an optical fiber array. The image is applied from the element-side surfaceof the array, which is substantially rectangular, to an imaging elementthat is rectangular. The image that has been photographed is converted in accordance with the image signals generated at the object-side surface. Hence, the entire surface of the imaging elementcan serve as effective photographing region. In addition, the image of the camera, which is formed on the center part of the object-side surface, is not transmitted to the imaging element

Photographing apparatus, photographing method, and method for measuring converted data representing a fiber-array image

The present invention provides an imaging apparatus capable of imaging a wide area, controlling parallax to achieve an excellent image quality, and utilizing an imaging element with a relatively large package. The imaging apparatus for imaging a wide area as a subject by dividing the subject into a plurality of subject portions and respectively imaging the subject portions using a plurality of imaging meansis configured such that the imaging meansincludes lensesA,B, and imaging element; respective NP pointsof the a plurality of imaging meansare concentrated within a minute radius region based on one of the NP points as a center; an optical elementhaving a reflection function is arranged behind a refraction surface of the lenslocated at the nearest position from the subject in each of the imaging means; the imaging elementis arranged behind the optical elementhaving the reflection function and outside of a space formed by straight lines which pass from the NP pointto circumferential portions in respective directions of the lens; and light beams bent by the optical elementhaving the reflection function are detected by the imaging element

In order to prevent the upper part of a subject such as a multistoried building or the like from being photographed in a short form when a wide angle shot is carried out, image pick-up meansare provided at intervals of 90 degrees on a baseThe image pick-up meansrespectively have front convex lensesand image pick-up partsalong vertical planes parallel to each other. The front convex lensesare displaced along the vertical planes so as to be provided at higher positions than those of the image pick-up partsThe NP points of the image pick-up meansare arranged to respectively correspond to each other so that a parallax is reduced.

image pick-up device

An image pickup device which can obtain an image of wide range picked up by a plurality of cameras is provided by preventing occurrence of parallax. The image pickup device is constructed such that an object of wide range is divided into a plurality of divided object portions to be separately picked up by a plurality of image pickup elements and images of divided object portions are processed into one combined video image by a processing element to which information on video images supplied from the respective image pickup elements is input; the image pickup element includes a lensand an image pickup elementwhich detects rays of light passed through the lens, and when principal rays positioned in a Gauss area are selected from among the principal rays passing through the center of an aperture stopof the lensin the image pickup element and a point where linear components of the selected principal rays in an object side space are extended to intersect an optical axis is defined as an NP point, in respective image pickup elements a position of the NP pointis set behind the image pickup elementand respective NP points of the plurality of image pickup elements are made to congregate within a predetermined radius area in which one NP pointis centered.

An imaging device includes a plurality of plane mirrors disposed into a polygonal pyramid shape, and a plurality of cameras disposed so as to individually face to the plurality of plane mirrors, wherein each of the plurality of cameras includes a lens, and an incident angle of a light beam traveling along an optical axis of the lens of each of the plurality of cameras on the corresponding one of the plurality of plane mirrors is less than 45&#xb0;. With this configuration, the sizes of the mirrors and the whole size of the imaging device are reduced, to thereby miniaturize the imaging device.

An image pickup apparatus which can suppress appearance of a parallax between images picked up by multiple cameras is disclosed. The image pickup apparatus includes several video cameras for individually picking tip images of a number of divisional image pickup objects of an image pickup object extending over a wide range. A processing section is provided for receiving image information from the video cameras and processing the image information to produce a single image by stitching images presented by the image information. A lens set including a number of lenses is provided in a lens barrel of each of the video cameras and has an aperture stop interposed therein. In one of the video camera, a straight line component in an object space of a principal ray which passes the center of the aperture stop and is positioned in a Gauss region is extended, and a point at which the extension intersects with the optical axis of the lens set is set as a first non-parallax point. The lens sets of the other video cameras are disposed such that such non-parallax points thereof are positioned within a spherical region of a radius of approximately 20 mm centered at the first non-parallax point.

Wide range image pickup apparatus and arrangement for suppressing the appearance of parallax

An image pickup device which can obtain an image of wide range picked up by a plurality of cameras is provided by preventing occurrence of parallax. The image pickup device is constructed such that an object of wide range is divided into a plurality of divided object portions to be separately picked up by a plurality of image pickup elements and images of divided object portions are processed into one combined video image by a processing element to which information on video images supplied from the respective image pickup elements is input; the image pickup element includes a lensand an image pickup elementwhich detects rays of light passed through the lensand when principal rays positioned in a Gauss area are selected from among the principal rays passing through the center of an aperture stopof the lensin the image pickup element and a point where linear components of the selected principal rays in an object side space are extended to intersect an optical axis is defined as an NP pointin respective image pickup elements a position of the NP pointis set behind the image pickup elementand respective NP points of the plurality of image pickup elements are made to congregate within a predetermined radius area in which one NP pointis centered.

Growing community of inventors

Kanagawa, Japan

Koichi Yoshikawa