Swing-driven solid-state color image sensor

Abstract

A color image sensing system includes a CCD image sensor with an optical color filter. A CCD driver is provided to electrically drive the image sensor, which is attached to a vibration table serving as a swing-driver for moving the image sensor along a horizontal direction such that each cell of the image sensor shifts, in a frame period including first and second field periods, between four different sampling positions substantially aligned in the horizontal direction. During each field period, each cell is positioned at two sampling positions, wherein a brightness signal component is produced at one sampling position and color signal components are produced at these sampling positions. The distance between two sampling positions at which the brightness signal components of the first and second field images are produced is set to be half the horizontal pitch of the cells of the image sensor. The remaining two sampling positions of the four sampling positions are apart from each other by one-and-half times the horizontal cell pitch. A color frame image is thus reproduced by electrically adding the first and second field images to increase the number of picture elements to more than the actual number of cells, thereby improving the horizontal image resolution of the frame image and minimizing the generation of color moire in the frame image. The swing-drive operation of the image sensor is repeated in synchronism with the frame period.