Back to results
US 10,432,880 B2Granted
Imaging apparatus, imaging system, and driving method for imaging apparatus
AssigneeCanon Kabushiki Kaisha
InventorsHidetoshi Hayashi, Shintaro Takenaka
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
An imaging apparatus includes a scanning circuit configured to perform shutter scanning and readout scanning, a first control unit configured to control the capacitance setting unit to set a capacitance value of the input node in the readout scanning, and a second control unit configured to control the capacitance setting unit to set a capacitance value of the input node in the shutter scanning.
Claims20
An imaging apparatus comprising:
- a pixel array having a plurality of rows of a plurality of pixels, the pixels each including:
- a photoelectric converting unit configured to generate electric charges corresponding to incident light;
- an amplification transistor having an input node, the amplification transistor configured to output a signal corresponding to electric charges in the input node;
- a transfer transistor configured to transfer the electric charges generated by the photoelectric converting unit to the input node;
- a reset transistor configured to reset the input node to a predetermined voltage;
- and
- a capacitance setting unit configured to set a capacitance value of the input node,
- a scanning circuit configured to perform shutter scanning sequentially performing processing of resetting electric charges of the photoelectric converting units on each row of the plurality of pixels by turning on the transfer transistors and the reset transistors, and readout scanning sequentially performing processing of transferring electric charges of the photoelectric converting unit to the input node on each row of the plurality of pixels by turning on the transfer transistors;
- a first control unit configured to control the capacitance setting unit to set a capacitance value of the input node in the readout scanning;
- and
- a second control unit configured to control the capacitance setting unit to set a capacitance value of the input node in the shutter scanning.
8 more elements
An imaging system comprising:
- an imaging apparatus;
- and
- a signal processing unit configured to process a signal output from the imaging apparatus,
- the imaging apparatus having
- a pixel array having a plurality of rows of a plurality of pixels, the pixels each including:
- a photoelectric converting unit configured to generate electric charges corresponding to incident light;
- an amplification transistor having an input node, the amplification transistor configured to output a signal corresponding to electric charges in the input node;
- a transfer transistor configured to transfer the electric charges generated by the photoelectric converting unit to the input node;
- a reset transistor configured to reset the input node to a predetermined voltage;
- and
- a capacitance setting unit configured to set a capacitance value of the input node,
- a scanning circuit configured to perform shutter scanning sequentially performing processing of resetting electric charges of the photoelectric converting units on each row of the plurality of pixels by turning on the transfer transistors and the reset transistors and readout scanning sequentially performing processing of transferring electric charges of the photoelectric converting unit to the input node on each row of the plurality of pixels by turning on the transfer transistors;
- a first control unit configured to control the capacitance setting unit to set a capacitance value of the input node in the readout scanning;
- and
- a second control unit configured to control the capacitance setting unit to set a capacitance value of the input node in the shutter scanning.
12 more elements
A driving method for an imaging apparatus, the imaging apparatus having a pixel array having a plurality of rows of a plurality of pixels, the pixels each including:
- a photoelectric converting unit configured to generate electric charges corresponding to incident light;
- an amplification transistor having an input node, the amplification transistor configured to output a signal corresponding to electric charges in the input node;
- a capacitance setting unit configured to set a capacitance value of the input node,
- the method comprising:
- performing shutter scanning sequentially performing processing of resetting electric charges of the photoelectric converting units on each row of the plurality of pixels and readout scanning sequentially performing processing of transferring electric charges of the photoelectric converting unit to the input node on each row of the plurality of pixels;
- and
- separately performing
- control of the capacitance setting unit to set a capacitance value of the input node in the readout scanning by a first control unit;
- and
- control of the capacitance setting unit to set a capacitance value of the input node in the shutter scanning by a second control unit.
7 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.