Photoelectric conversion element, photoelectric conversion device, photoelectric conversion method, and storage medium
AssigneeCanon Kabushiki Kaisha
InventorSHIGEYUKI KOBAYASHI
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A photoelectric conversion element includes: an avalanche photodiode; a first counter configured to count each of an output signal of the avalanche photodiode of a first pixel and an output signal of the avalanche photodiode of a second pixel; a calculation unit configured to generate third output signals from the output signal of the avalanche photodiode of the first pixel and the output signal of the avalanche photodiode of the second pixel; and a second counter circuit configured to count the number of third output signals.
Claims19
A photoelectric conversion element comprising:
- an avalanche photodiode;
- a first counter configured to count each of an output signal of the avalanche photodiode of a first pixel and an output signal of the avalanche photodiode of a second pixel;
- a calculation unit configured to generate third output signals from the output signal of the avalanche photodiode of the first pixel and the output signal of the avalanche photodiode of the second pixel;
- and
- a second counter circuit configured to count a number of third output signals.
A photoelectric conversion method using a photoelectric conversion element that includes an avalanche photodiode, a first counter configured to count each of an output signal of the avalanche photodiode of a first pixel and an output signal of the avalanche photodiode of a second pixel, a calculation unit configured to generate third output signals from the output signal of the avalanche photodiode of the first pixel and the output signal of the avalanche photodiode of the second pixel and a second counter circuit configured to count the number of third output signals, the method comprising:
- detecting occurrence of count omission of the avalanche photodiode based on at least the third output signal.
A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium configured to store a computer program for a photoelectric conversion method of executing the following process,
- wherein the photoelectric conversion element includes an avalanche photodiode, a first counter configured to count each of an output signal of the avalanche photodiode of a first pixel and an output signal of the avalanche photodiode of a second pixel, a calculation unit configured to generate third output signals from the output signal of the avalanche photodiode of the first pixel and the output signal of the avalanche photodiode of the second pixel, and a second counter circuit configured to count the number of third output signals, and
- wherein the process includes detecting occurrence of count omission of the avalanche photodiode based on at least the third output signal.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.