Planar light illumination and imaging device with modulated coherent illumination that reduces speckle noise induced by coherent illumination
First Claim
1. An imaging device capable of detecting an image of a target object with reduced speckle-pattern noise, said imaging device comprising:
- at least one image detection array and image formation optics that provide a field of view corresponding to said at least one image detection array;
at least one illumination module that produces planar light illumination that substantially overlaps the field of view corresponding to said image detection array, said at least one illumination module including at least one source of coherent illumination; and
illumination control circuitry that modulates a power level of illumination produced by said source of coherent illumination during each photo-integration time period of said image detection array so that said target object is illuminated with a spatially coherent-reduced laser illumination and numerous substantially different time-varying speckle-noise patterns are produced at said image detection array over the photo-integration time period thereof;
whereby said numerous substantially different time-varying speckle-noise patterns are detected at said image detection array over said photo-integration time period, and said detected speckle-noise patterns are temporally averaged at said image detection array during said photo-integration time period thereof,thereby reducing the power of speckle noise patterns at said at least one image detection array.
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Abstract
A device including at least one image detection array and image formation optics that provide a field of view corresponding to the image detection array. At least one illumination module (which includes at least one source of coherent illumination) produces planar light illumination that substantially overlaps the field of view corresponding to the image detection array. Illumination control circuitry modulates the power level of illumination produced by the source of coherent illumination during each photo-integration time period of the image detection array to thereby reduce speckle noise in images captured by the image detection array. The illumination control circuitry preferably modulates the power level of illumination by controlling the number and/or duration of time periods corresponding to different power levels of illumination produced by the source of coherent illumination during each photo-integration time period of the image detection array.
91 Citations
22 Claims
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1. An imaging device capable of detecting an image of a target object with reduced speckle-pattern noise, said imaging device comprising:
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at least one image detection array and image formation optics that provide a field of view corresponding to said at least one image detection array; at least one illumination module that produces planar light illumination that substantially overlaps the field of view corresponding to said image detection array, said at least one illumination module including at least one source of coherent illumination; and illumination control circuitry that modulates a power level of illumination produced by said source of coherent illumination during each photo-integration time period of said image detection array so that said target object is illuminated with a spatially coherent-reduced laser illumination and numerous substantially different time-varying speckle-noise patterns are produced at said image detection array over the photo-integration time period thereof; whereby said numerous substantially different time-varying speckle-noise patterns are detected at said image detection array over said photo-integration time period, and said detected speckle-noise patterns are temporally averaged at said image detection array during said photo-integration time period thereof, thereby reducing the power of speckle noise patterns at said at least one image detection array. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11)
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12. A method for illuminating at least one imaging array and reducing speckle noise in images captured by said at least one image detection array, the method comprising the steps of:
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providing said at least one image detection array and image formation optics that provide a field of view corresponding to said at least one image detection array; providing at least one illumination module that produces planar light illumination that substantially overlaps the field of view corresponding to said image detection array, said at least one illumination module including at least one source of coherent illumination; and modulating a power level of illumination produced by said source of coherent illumination during each photo-integration time period of said image detection array, so that said target object is illuminated with spatially coherent-reduced laser illumination and numerous substantially different time-varying speckle-noise patterns are produced at said image detection array over the photo-integration time period thereof, whereby said numerous substantially different time-varying speckle-noise patterns are detected at said image detection array over said photo-integration time period, and said detected speckle-noise patterns are temporally averaged at said image detection array during said photo-integration time period thereof, thereby reducing the power of speckle noise patterns at said at least one image detection array. - View Dependent Claims (13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22)
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Specification