Image pickup apparatus and processing method for result of image pickup

• US 8,687,069 B2
• Filed: 11/30/2012
• Issued: 04/01/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 01/13/2005
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Sony Corporation (Sony Group Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Sony Corporation (Sony Group Corp.)
• Inventors: Kobayashi, Seiji
• Primary Examiner(s): Tran, Sinh
• Assistant Examiner(s): FLOHRE, JASON A
• Application Number:
  US13/690,999
• Publication Number:
  US 20130088608A1
• Time in Patent Office: 487 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 348/208.12
• CPC Class Codes: H01L 27/14607 Geometry of the photosensitive area
• CPC Class Codes: H01L 27/1462 Coatings
• CPC Class Codes: H01L 27/14621 Colour filter arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H01L 27/14623 Optical shielding
• CPC Class Codes: H01L 27/14627 Microlenses
• CPC Class Codes: H01L 27/14634 Assemblies, i.e. Hybrid structures
• CPC Class Codes: H01L 27/14636 Interconnect structures
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 23/60 Control of cameras or camera modules
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 23/68 for stable pick-up of the scene, e.g. compensating for camera body vibrations
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 23/681 Motion detection
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 23/6811 based on the image signal
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 23/71 Circuitry for evaluating the brightness variation
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 23/72 Combination of two or more compensation controls
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 23/73 by influencing the exposure time
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 25/44 by partially reading an SSIS array
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 25/50 Control of the SSIS exposure
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 25/51 Control of the gain
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 25/79 Arrangements of circuitry being divided between different or multiple substrates, chips or circuit boards, e.g. stacked image sensors
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/145 Movement estimation for video coding H04N19/51

Abstract

The present invention is applied to an image pickup apparatus for which, for example, a CMOS solid-state image pickup element is used. One screen image is divided into a plurality of blocks, and a motion is detected for each of the blocks to control the exposure time of the block.

Claims

1. A solid-state image device, comprising:

a first substrate including a pixel unit having a plurality of pixels arranged in a matrix for outputting a pixel signal;

a second substrate including at least either a motion detection unit detecting a motion amount of the pixel signal in each block including at least one or more pixels or a control unit forming on the second substrate and controlling exposure time of each block based on a result of the detection by the motion detection unit; and

a connect unit connecting the pixel unit and the motion detection unit,

wherein the pixel unit outputs the results of the pixel of the blocks simultaneously and parallelly thereby to output the results of the pixel of the optical image, and the motion detection unit processes the results of the pixel of the blocks outputted from the pixel unit individually to detect the motion amount for each of the blocks,

wherein the motion detection unit includes an average value calculation circuit configured to cumulatively add the results of the pixel for each of the blocks in a unit of a frame to calculate an average value for each of the blocks, and an interframe difference calculation circuit for calculating an interframe difference value of the average values of each of the blocks calculated by the average value calculation circuit, the interframe difference value being a difference between, for a same block of the blocks, the average value calculated in a current frame and the average value calculated in a preceding frame, and detecting the motion amount for each of the blocks based on the corresponding interframe difference value.

2. The solid-state image device according to claim 1, wherein the control unit controls, based on the result of the detection by the motion detection unit, the exposure time of each block such that the exposure time decreases as the motion amount increases.

3. The solid-state image device according to claim 1, wherein the connect unit is micro bumps.

4. The solid-state image device according to claim 1, further comprising encoding unit for performing an encoding process based on the result of the detection by the motion detection unit.

5. The solid-state image device according to claim 1, further comprising a signal level correction unit for correcting and outputting a signal level of the result of each block which varies in accordance with control of the exposure time.

6. The solid-state image device according to claim 1, further comprising a media for recording the pixel signal.

7. The solid-state image device according to claim 4, further comprising a media for recording a result of the encoding process.

8. The solid-state image device according to claim 1, further comprising an amplification unit for amplifying the pixel signal of each block based on the exposure time of each block.