The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Jan. 25, 2005
Filed:
Mar. 06, 2001
Kazuhiko Sugimoto, Shijonawate, JP;
Kenichi Kikuchi, Kawanishi, JP;
Kazuhiko Sugimoto, Shijonawate, JP;
Kenichi Kikuchi, Kawanishi, JP;
Sanyo Electric Co., Ltd., Osaka, JP;
Abstract
A still camera utilizes a focus evaluation value based on an imaging video signal to execute an autofocus operation by a hill-climbing control method. A CPU divides a focus area into a plurality of regions to obtain a focus evaluation value from a digital integrator for each of the regions. When the autofocus operation is restarted from the state of a monitoring mode in accordance with a variation of the focus evaluation value, the CPU detects a further hill of the focus evaluation value while forcibly moving a focus lens position always toward a near side, and when a maximal value of the once detected focus evaluation value is less than a certain standard value, additionally executes the autofocus operation.