Image pickup apparatus

• US 20060290795A1
• Filed: 08/29/2006
• Published: 12/28/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 01/11/2002
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Hiroshi Itoh
• Original Assignee: Hiroshi Itoh
• Inventors: Itoh, Hiroshi
• Application Number:
  US11/512,533
• Publication Number:
  US 20060290795A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 348/246
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 23/651 for reducing power consumption by affecting camera operations, e.g. sleep mode, hibernation mode or power off of selective parts of the camera
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 23/811 by dust removal, e.g. from surfaces of the image sensor or processing of the image signal output by the electronic image sensor
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 25/68 applied to defects

Abstract

An image pickup apparatus is constructed as including: a taking lens; CCD image pickup device for converting object light into electrical signals; AD converter for converting image pickup signals into digital signals; a defect detecting section for detecting defect pixels in the digital image pickup signals; a defect correcting section for performing correction processing of the defect pixels detected at the defect detecting section; and a system controlling section for managing the operation of the entire system. The taking lens is attachable/detachable and interchangeable and a function is provided at the system controlling section to detect attachment/detachment of the taking lens. The defect detecting section is caused to perform defect detection when the taking lens has been detached so that the power consumption is reduced and at the same time a missing of image taking chance due to defect detection is prevented.

Claims

1. An image pickup apparatus comprising:

a taking lens;

an image pickup device;

defect pixel detection means for detecting defect pixels occurring on the image pickup device; and

incident light condition detecting means for detecting the condition of incident light onto said image pickup device,

wherein said defect pixel detection means detects defect pixels in a time period during which an image taken by main exposure requiring a recording by said image pickup device cannot be obtained, and

wherein said defect pixel detection means detects defect pixels when a condition that light incident on said image pickup device is very small in amount is being detected by said incident light condition detecting means.

2. The image pickup apparatus according to claim 1 further comprising:

light cutoff means for cutting off incident light onto said image pickup device,

wherein said incident light condition detecting means detects the condition of a very small amount of the incident light onto said image pickup device by condition where light is cut off by said light cutoff means.

3. The image pickup apparatus according to claim 1 further comprising:

a mechanism capable of switching the optical path of the incident light onto said image pickup device,

wherein said incident light condition detecting means detects the condition of a very small amount of the incident light onto said image pickup device by the fact that the optical path is being switched to an optical path different from the optical path to said image pickup device by said optical path switching mechanism.

4. The image pickup apparatus according to claim 1 further comprising:

incident light amount detection means for detecting an incident light amount onto said image pickup apparatus,

wherein said incident light condition detecting means detects the condition of a very small amount of the incident light onto said image pickup device by the fact that a light amount detected by said incident light amount detection means is smaller than a predetermined threshold.