Hand-supportable planar laser illumination and imaging (pliim) based camera system capable of producing digital linear images of an object, containing pixels having a substantially uniform aspect-ratio independent of the measured relative velocity of an object while manually moving said pliim based camera system past said object during illumination and imaging operations

A hand-supportable planar laser illumination and imaging (PLIIM) based camera system for producing digital linear images of an object within a working range, wherein said digital linear images contain pixels having a substantially uniform aspect-ratio independent of the measured relative velocity of said object while said PLIIM based camera system is manually moved past said object during object illumination and imaging operations, said hand-supportable PLIIM based camera system comprising:

• a hand-supportable housing having a light transmission aperture;
• a PLIIM-based linear imaging subsystem mounted within said hand-supportable housing, and having
• a planar laser illumination array (PLIA) including a plurality of laser diodes for producing and projecting a planar laser illumination beam (PLIB) through said light transmission aperture, so as to illuminate an object as said hand-supportable housing is manually moved past the object during object illumination and imaging operations, and
• an image formation and detection (IFD) module having a linear image detection array and image forming optics for providing said linear image detection array with a field of view (FOV) which is projected through said light transmission aperture, and along which linear images of illuminated portions of said object can be detected,
• wherein said PLIB and FOV are arranged in a coplanar relationship along the working range of said PLIIM based camera system so that the PLIB illuminates primarily within said FOV of the IFD module;
• an object velocity measurement subsystem disposed within said hand-supportable housing, for determining the velocity of the object relative to said hand-supportable housing and generating object velocity data indicative of the determined velocity of the object;
• a camera control computer, mounted within said hand-supportable housing, for controlling the operation of said PLHM-based linear imaging subsystem, in automatic response to object velocity data generated by said object velocity measurement subsystem,
• wherein said camera control computer
• (1) uses said object velocity data to automatically determine a photo-integration time period parameter for the linear image detection array which produces digital linear images of said object, containing pixels having a substantially uniform aspect-ratio, independent of velocity of said object;
• and
• (2) uses said determined photo-integration time period parameter to automatically control the operation of said linear image detection array so that said linear image detection array automatically produces digital linear images of said object, containing pixels having a substantially uniform aspect-ratio independent of the measured velocity of the object.