Electronic endoscope with light-amount adjustment apparatus

• US 6,980,227 B2
• Filed: 10/01/2002
• Issued: 12/27/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 10/01/2001
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Hoya Corporation
• Original Assignee: Pentax Corporation (Hoya Corporation)
• Inventors: Iida, Mitsuru, Iriyama, Kenichi, Hibi, Haruhiko
• Primary Examiner(s): VO, TUNG T
• Application Number:
  US10/260,335
• Publication Number:
  US 20030076411A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,183 Days
• Field of Search: H04/N00.9/47, 348 69- 97, 348/229.1, 600/118, 600/180, 382/54, 04/N
• US Class Current: 348/69
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/183 for receiving images from a single remote source

Abstract

An electronic endoscope has a video-scope with an image sensor and a video-processor. The video-scope has an objective lens and an illuminating lens in a tip portion. Further, the electronic endoscope has a luminance calculator and a light-amount adjuster. The luminance calculator divides the total area of a subject image into a plurality of division areas, defines weighted areas from the plurality of division areas in accordance with the tip characteristics of the video-scope, and calculates a total luminance value of the subject image by putting priority on predetermined weighted areas relative to the other areas. The light-amount adjuster adjusts the quantity of light illuminating the subject in accordance with the total luminance value.

Claims

1. An electronic endoscope having a video-scope with an image sensor and a video-processor, said video-scope being one of a plurality of connectable video-scopes and being selectively connected to said video-processor, said electronic endoscope comprising:

a light source that emits light;

an illuminating lens that is provided in a tip of said video-scope and that transmits the light to a subject;

an objective lens that is provided in the tip of said video-scope and that forms a subject image on said image sensor;

an image processor that generates luminance signals from image signals read from said image sensor;

a tip characteristic detector that detects tip characteristics corresponding to a type of said video-scope, the tip characteristics including at least an arrangement relationship between said objective lens and said illuminating lens;

a metering setter that defines a plurality of division areas by dividing the total area of the subject image into a plurality of areas and that sets a plurality of weighted coefficients corresponding to the plurality of division areas, in accordance with the tip characteristics;

a luminance calculator that calculates a plurality of segment luminance values corresponding to the plurality of division areas, and that calculates a total luminance value indicating a total brightness of the subject image by multiplying each of the plurality of the segment luminance values by a corresponding weighted coefficient among the plurality of weighted coefficients; and

a light-amount adjuster that adjusts a quantity of light illuminating the subject in accordance with the total luminance value.

2. The electronic endoscope of claim 1, wherein said metering setter assigns high-luminance weighted coefficients to high-luminance areas that have higher segment luminance values relative to the other division areas, due to the tip characteristics, the values of the high-luminance weighted coefficients being larger than the values of the weighted coefficients for the other division areas, and

wherein said luminance calculator performs a weighted average metering by setting said high-luminance areas as weighted areas.

3. The electronic endoscope of claim 1, wherein said metering setter sets the values of the weighted coefficients to same values in accordance with the tip characteristics, and

wherein said luminance calculator performs an average metering to calculate the total luminance value.

4. The electronic endoscope of claim 1, wherein said illuminating lens includes two lenses and said objective lens is a single lens, and

wherein the arrangement relationship includes a relationship regarding the position and the distance of said objective lens relative to said two lenses.

5. The electronic endoscope of claim 1, further comprising:

a forceps tube for installing an implement in said video-scope, a forceps outlet being formed in the tip of said video-scope,

wherein the arrangement relationship includes a relationship regarding the position of the forceps outlet relative to said objective lens and said illuminating lens,

wherein said metering setter defines a forceps area, in which an implement image is displayed, from the plurality of division areas in accordance with the tip characteristics, and

wherein said luminance calculator determines whether a segment luminance value obtained in the forceps area is larger than a boundary luminance value corresponding to a halation generation, said luminance calculator calculating the total luminance value on the basis of division areas except for the forceps area when the segment luminance value is larger than the boundary luminance value.

6. The electronic endoscope of claim 1, wherein said metering setter radially divides the subject image.

7. The electronic endoscope of claim 1, further comprising:

a weighted coefficient memory that stores a series of weighted coefficient data having values of the plurality of weighted coefficients corresponding to the plurality of video-scopes,

wherein said metering setter reads the weighted coefficient data corresponding to the tip characteristics from the series of weighted coefficient data and defines the values of the weighted coefficients.

8. The electronic endoscope of claim 1, further comprising:

a tip characteristic memory in said video-scope that stores the tip characteristics as data,

wherein said tip characteristic detector detects the tip characteristics by reading the tip characteristics.

9. An automatic light-amount adjustment apparatus for an electronic endoscope, said electronic endoscope having a video-scope with an image sensor and a video-processor, said video-scope being one of a plurality of connectable video-scopes and being selectively connected to said video-processor, said video-scope having an objective lens and an illuminating lens in a tip of said video-scope, light for illuminating a subject being radiated from the tip via said illuminating lens, light reflected on the subject being directed to said image sensor via said objective lens, said automatic light-amount adjustment apparatus comprising:

an image processor that generates luminance signals from image signals read from said image sensor;

a tip characteristic detector that detects tip characteristics corresponding to a type of said video-scope, the tip characteristics including at least an arrangement relationship between said objective lens and said illuminating lens;

a metering setter that defines a plurality of division areas by dividing the total area of a subject image into a plurality of areas and that sets a plurality of weighted coefficients corresponding to the plurality of division areas, in accordance with the tip characteristics;

a luminance calculator that calculates a plurality of segment luminance values corresponding to the plurality of division areas, and that calculates a total luminance value indicating a total brightness of the subject image by multiplying each of the plurality of the segment luminance values by a corresponding weighted coefficient among the plurality of weighted coefficients; and

a light-amount adjuster that adjusts a quantity of light illuminating the subject in accordance with the total luminance value.

10. An electronic endoscope having a video-scope with an image sensor and a video-processor, said video-scope having an objective lens and an illuminating lens in a tip portion, said electronic endoscope comprising:

a luminance calculator that divides a total area of a subject image into a plurality of division areas and that assigns weighted areas to the plurality of division areas in accordance with the tip characteristics of said video-scope, the tip characteristics including at least an arrangement relationship between said objective lens and said illuminating lens, and that calculates a total luminance value of the subject image by putting priority on the weighted areas relative to the other areas; and

a light-amount adjuster that adjusts a quantity of light illuminating the subject in accordance with the total luminance value.