Hong Kong Applied Science and Technology Research Institute Company, Limited

Lap Chi (David) Leung

Kwok Kuen (David) Kwong

Chun Fai Wong

Yat Tung Lai

Kam Hung Chan

A Optical Black Pixel (OBP) cancellation circuit corrects offsets in sensors in a CCD/CMOS image sensor when reading dark pixels such at the periphery. A pixel voltage is switched to a sampling capacitor during two phases of the same pixel pulse. Sampling capacitors and feedback capacitors connect to differential inputs of an amplifier. An accumulating capacitor accumulates voltage differences and generates a common-mode voltage that is fed back to another sampling capacitor that stores an amplifier offset. The sampling capacitor and accumulating capacitor and their associated switches form a discrete-time first-order low-pass filter that filters the pixel voltage during the first phase. In the second phase the amplifier acts as a unity-gain amplifier to output an average of the pixel voltage differences generated during an OBP time when blackened or covered pixels are read from the image sensor.

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Hong Kong, China

Lap Chi (David) Leung