Liquid droplet recognition apparatus, raindrop recognition apparatus, and on-vehicle monitoring apparatus
First Claim
1. A liquid droplet recognition apparatus for detecting a liquid droplet attached to a front surface of a transparent member, the apparatus comprising:
- an image pickup apparatus that picks up a vertically polarized light image and a horizontally polarized light image at the front surface of the transparent member from a side of a rear surface of the transparent member; and
a signal processing unit that determines whether the liquid droplet is attached to the front surface of the transparent member based on a polarized-light image ratio composed of the vertically polarized light image and the horizontally polarized light image picked up by the image pickup apparatus,wherein the image pickup apparatus includesa lens array having a plurality of image pickup lenses on a same substrate,a filter that is separated into two polarizer regions with transmission axes orthogonal to each other so as to correspond to light fluxes passing through the plurality of image pickup lenses of the lens array, andan image pickup unit having a plurality of image pickup regions that pick up an image of a subject by receiving light passing through the respective polarizer regions of the filter,wherein the vertically polarized light image is picked up by any of the plurality of image pickup regions of the image pickup unit and the horizontally polarized light image is picked up by another of the plurity of image pickup regions thereof, andwherein the signal processing unit includes an image position correction unit that corrects a parallax positional shift between the vertically polarized light image and the horizontally polarized light image picked up by the plurality of image pickup regions.
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Accused Products
Abstract
Disclosed is a liquid droplet recognition apparatus for detecting liquid droplets attached to a front surface of a transparent member. The apparatus includes an image pickup apparatus that picks up a vertically polarized light image and a horizontally polarized light image at the front surface of the transparent member from a side of a rear surface of the transparent member; and a signal processing unit that determines whether the liquid droplets are attached to the front surface of the transparent member based on a polarized-light image ratio composed of the vertically polarized light image and the horizontally polarized light image picked up by the image pickup apparatus.
7 Citations
10 Claims
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1. A liquid droplet recognition apparatus for detecting a liquid droplet attached to a front surface of a transparent member, the apparatus comprising:
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an image pickup apparatus that picks up a vertically polarized light image and a horizontally polarized light image at the front surface of the transparent member from a side of a rear surface of the transparent member; and a signal processing unit that determines whether the liquid droplet is attached to the front surface of the transparent member based on a polarized-light image ratio composed of the vertically polarized light image and the horizontally polarized light image picked up by the image pickup apparatus, wherein the image pickup apparatus includes a lens array having a plurality of image pickup lenses on a same substrate, a filter that is separated into two polarizer regions with transmission axes orthogonal to each other so as to correspond to light fluxes passing through the plurality of image pickup lenses of the lens array, and an image pickup unit having a plurality of image pickup regions that pick up an image of a subject by receiving light passing through the respective polarizer regions of the filter, wherein the vertically polarized light image is picked up by any of the plurality of image pickup regions of the image pickup unit and the horizontally polarized light image is picked up by another of the plurity of image pickup regions thereof, and wherein the signal processing unit includes an image position correction unit that corrects a parallax positional shift between the vertically polarized light image and the horizontally polarized light image picked up by the plurality of image pickup regions. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 10)
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6. An on-vehicle monitoring apparatus comprising:
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a first light source; first and second image pickup apparatuses; and a signal processing unit; wherein the light source, the first and second image pickup apparatuses, and the signal processing unit are mounted on a vehicle, wherein the light source irradiates a windshield of the vehicle with a parallel light flux at an incident angle of Brewster'"'"'s angle, wherein the first image pickup apparatuses picks up an S-polarized light image and a P-polarized light image by receiving reflection light of the light flux irradiated from the light source to the windshield while picking up an image of a subject ahead of the vehicle, wherein the second image pickup apparatuses picks up an image of the subject ahead of the vehicle, and wherein the signal processing unit has a raindrop detection processing unit and an external information processing unit, the raindrop detection processing unit determining whether a raindrop is attached to the windshield based on a reflectance difference between the S-polarized light image and the P-polarized light image picked up by the first image pickup apparatus and the external information processing unit calculating a distance to the subject based on the images of the subject ahead of the vehicle picked up by the first image pickup apparatus and the second image pickup apparatus, wherein the first image pickup apparatus includes a lens array having a plurality of image pickup lenses on a same substrate, a filter that is separated into two polarizer regions with transmission axes orthogonal to each other so as to correspond to light fluxes passing through the plurality of image pickup lenses of the lens array, and an image pickup unit having a plurality of image pickup regions that pick up an image of a subject by receiving light passing through the respective polarizer regions of the filter, wherein a vertically polarized light image is picked up by any of the plurality of image pickup regions of the image pickup unit and the horizontally polarized light image is picked up by another of the plurity of image pickup regions thereof, and wherein the signal processing unit includes an image position correction unit that corrects a parallax positional shift between the vertically polarized light image and the horizontally polarized light image picked up by the plurality of image pickup regions. - View Dependent Claims (7, 8, 9)
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Specification