High speed defect detection apparatus having defect detection circuits mounted in the camera housing

A defect detection system comprising

• a camera housing;
• a TDI CCD two-dimensional array sensor mounted in the camera housing and having a plurality of outputs each for generating a video signal of a corresponding section of an image of a moving object;
• a lens mounted on the housing for projecting the image of the moving object onto the array sensor;
• a plurality of defect detecting circuits mounted in the camera housing and being connected to the respective plurality of outputs of the array sensor;
• a coordinate counter for generating a coordinate for pixels in the video signals from the outputs;
• a plurality of temporary memories mounted in the camera housing for storing defect pixel values detected by the respective plurality of defect detecting circuits and the coordinate for each of the detected defect pixel values;
• a section counter for generating a plurality of bits identifying the image section containing each of the detected defect pixels;
• and
• camera output means mounted in the camera housing for reading the temporary memories and transferring out of the camera housing to a remote image processing unit the stored defect pixel values and the stored coordinates along with the image section identifying bits.

A defect detection system comprising:

• a camera housing;
• a CCD array sensor mounted in the camera housing and having a plurality of outputs each for generating a video signal of a corresponding section of an image of a moving object;
• a lens mounted on the housing for projecting the image of the moving object onto the array sensor;
• a plurality of defect detecting circuits mounted in the camera housing and being connected to the respective plurality of outputs of the array sensor;
• a plurality of temporary memories mounted in the camera housing for storing defect pixel values detected by the respective plurality of defect detecting circuits, each temporary memory including means for storing a coordinate for each detected defect pixel value and means for storing an end of line signal;
• and
• camera output means mounted in the camera housing for reading the temporary memories and including a counter for counting the end of line signals to sequentially select the plurality of temporary memories, means for reading the coordinates along with the defect pixel values, means for incorporating the output of the counter into the coordinates, and means for transferring the coordinates with the incorporated counter output along with the detected defect pixel values.

A defect detection system comprising

• an array sensor for generating successive pixel values of an image portion of a moving object, the array sensor having a plurality of outputs, each of the outputs for generating successive pixel values of a corresponding section of an image of a moving object;
• a plurality of defect detecting circuits, each of the defect detecting circuits connected to a corresponding one of the outputs of the array sensor for detecting defective pixel values in the pixel values of the corresponding section of the image portion;
• a coordinate counter for generating a coordinate for pixels in the video signals from the outputs;
• a temporary memory corresponding to each of the defect detecting circuits;
• means responsive to each defect detecting circuit detecting defective pixel values for storing the defective pixel values and the coordinate for each of the detected defective pixel values in the corresponding temporary memory;
• a section counter for generating a plurality of bits identifying the image section containing defect pixels corresponding to the detected defective pixel values;
• means for reading the temporary memories and transmitting out of the camera housing to a remote image processing unit the stored defective pixel values and the stored coordinates from each of the temporary memories along with the corresponding plurality of image section identifying bits at a rate which is less than the rate at which the array sensor generates the pixel values;
• and
• means for determining the presence of more than a predetermined number of unread stored defective pixel values in each of the temporary memories to disable the corresponding defective pixel value storing means.

A defect detection system comprising

• a TDI CCD two-dimensional array sensor having a plurality of outputs each for generating successive pixel values of a corresponding section of an image of a moving object, each output of the array sensor generating successive pixel values of each of a plurality of image lines of the corresponding image section;
• a plurality of defect detecting circuits connected to the respective plurality of outputs of the array sensor for detecting defective pixel values in the pixel values from the respective outputs;
• a plurality of temporary memories corresponding to the plurality of detecting means;
• a plurality of means responsive to the respective defect detecting circuits for storing the defective pixel values in the respective temporary memories;
• a plurality of means for storing end of line flags in the respective memories for each image line of the respective sections;
• means for reading out stored defective pixel values from the plurality of memories one memory at a time at a rate which is less than the rate at which the array sensor generates the pixel values;
• said reading out means also reading out each stored end of line flag after reading out any stored defective pixels of an image line corresponding to each end of line flag and sequencing to the reading out of the next memory in response to each end of line flag;
• a plurality of means for determining the presence of more than a predetermined number of unread stored defective pixel values in the respective memories to disable the respective defective pixel value storing means;
• said plurality of end of line flag storing means storing end of line flags in the respective memories for each image line of the respective sections irrespective of the number of unread stored defective pixel values;
• and
• wherein the reading out means includes means for discarding the end of line flags from all but one designated memory of the plurality of memories so that all defect pixels on a common line through the image sections are sequentially outputted with a single end of line flag.