Pixel compensating circuit, method for compensating pixels, and image taking apparatus employing such pixel compensating circuit

A pixel compensating method for compensating a defect pixel of a video signal, comprising the steps of:

• holding plural kinds of color information of defect pixel and pixels adjacent said defect pixel, said color information of said defect pixel including defective color information and non-defective color information;
• calculating differences between non-defective color information among said color information of said defect pixel and corresponding color information of said pixels adjacent said defect pixel;
• determining a reference pixel having color information that is the most similar to said non-defective color information;
• calculating an average value of said differences between said reference pixel and said defect pixel;
• and
• setting defective color information of said defect pixel to the value of the corresponding color information of said reference pixel minus said average value.

An image taking apparatus including a pixel compensating circuit for compensating defect pixels included in a video signal, wherein said pixel compensating circuit comprising:

• a color information holding unit for holding plural kinds of color information of a defect pixel and pixels adjacent to said defect pixel, said color information of said defect pixel including defective color information and non-defective color information;
• a difference calculating unit for calculating a difference between non-defective color information among said color information of said defect pixel and corresponding color information of said pixels adjacent to said defect pixel;
• a reference pixel determining unit for determining a reference pixel having color information that is the most similar to said non-defective color information;
• and
• a compensating unit for calculating an average value of said differences between said reference pixel and said defect pixel, and setting defective color information of said defect pixel to the value of the corresponding color information of said reference pixel minus said average value.