Solid state color imager with on-chip color balance
AssigneeCanon Kabushiki Kaisha
InventorsKatsuyoshi Maeshima, Atsushi Takeda, Shinobu Arimoto, Shizuo Hasegawa
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Abstract
A color image reading apparatus includes a plurality of line sensors which have different color filters and each of which has a plurality of light receiving elements. One of the plurality of line sensors has an opening width larger than those of the remaining line sensors. The apparatus also includes a correcting unit such as an edge emphasis circuit for correcting image signals output from the line sensors so as to obtain identical resolutions of the image signals, and a processing unit such as a masking circuit for performing color processing of the image signals corrected by the correcting unit.
Claims18
A color image reading apparatus, comprising:
- a plurality of line sensors for reading an original image line by line, said plurality of line sensors reading different color components of the original image, respectively,
- moving means for moving a read position of said plurality of line sensors on the original image;
- driving means for driving a predetermined one of said plurality of line sensors having a first storage time and driving another of said plurality of line sensors having a second storage time, the first storage time being longer than the second storage time;
- and
- correction means for equalizing resolutions of image signals representing the different color components by performing an interpolating process on image signals of at least two adjacent lines output from the driven line sensor having the first storage time to generate image signals of a line between the two adjacent lines.
A color image reading method, comprising the steps of:
- reading an original image line by line by a plurality of line sensors, said plurality of line sensors reading different color components of the original image, respectively;
- moving a read position of said plurality of line sensors on the original image;
- driving a predetermined one of said plurality of line sensors having a first storage time and driving another of said plurality of line sensors having a second storage time, the first storage time being longer than the second storage time;
- and
- equalizing resolutions of image signals representing the different color components by performing an interpolating process on image signals of at least two adjacent lines output from the driven sensor having the first storage time to generate image signals of a line between the two adjacent lines.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.