Provided is an imaging apparatus that captures a multispectral image of four bands or more. An imaging apparatus (1) includes an imaging optical system (10), an image sensor (100), and a signal processing unit (200). The imaging optical system (10) includes a bandpass filter unit (16) of which at least one of aperture regions transmits light beams of a plurality of wavelength ranges, and a polarization filter unit (18) that polarizes the light beams transmitted through the bandpass filter unit (16) in a plurality of directions, in a vicinity of a pupil thereof. The image sensor (100) receives light beams transmitted through a plurality of types of spectral filter elements and a plurality of types of polarization filter elements. The signal processing unit (200) processes signals output from the image sensor (100) to generate a plurality of image signals. In the imaging apparatus (1), the number of transmission wavelength ranges of at least one of the aperture regions of the bandpass filter unit (16) is equal to or less than the number of transmission wavelength ranges of the spectral filter element.

An optical sensor device, includes an optical sensor that has a set of sensor elements, an optical filter that includes a plurality of regions, and one or more processors. A region, of the plurality of regions, includes a first set of optical channels comprising optical channels that are configured to pass light associated with respective subranges of a first wavelength range, a second set of optical channels comprising optical channels that are configured to pass light associated with respective subranges of a second wavelength range, and a third set of optical channels comprising optical channels that are configured to pass light associated with respective subranges of a third wavelength range. The one or more processors are configured to obtain, from the optical sensor, sensor data associated with a scene and determine image information associated with the scene based on the spectral information.

Provided is an image sensor and an operation method of the image sensor. The image sensor includes a pixel array including a plurality of white pixels, a plurality of color pixels, and a plurality of auto focus (AF) pixels, a first shared pixel including the plurality of white pixels and the plurality of color pixels includes a first conversion gain transistor and a second conversion gain transistor configured to control a conversion gain of the first shared pixel, and a second shared pixel including some of the plurality of white pixels and the plurality of color pixels and at least one AF pixel includes a third conversion gain transistor and a fourth conversion gain transistor configured to control a conversion gain of the second shared pixel. The first conversion gain transistor, the second conversion gain transistor, the third conversion gain transistor, and the fourth conversion gain transistor are connected to different conversion gain control lines, respectively.

An image processing method and an image processing device is provided. The processing device comprises memory and a processor configured to receive a frame of color filtered image data comprising pixels which are spatially multiplexed according to a plurality of different light exposures, resample the color values as different frames of pixels for the plurality of different light exposures, fuse the resampled frames of pixels for the plurality of different light exposures into a frame of pixels according to a HDR format and color interpolate the fused frame of pixels. The processor is configured to interpolate, for each resampled frame, missing pixel color values based on the color values of adjacent resampled pixels in a same resampled frame. The color interpolated fused frame of pixels is processed in an image processing pipeline and converted to a YUV color space.

Disclosed are a solid-state imaging apparatus, a signal processing method of a solid-state imaging apparatus, and an electronic device, which are capable of correcting uneven sensitivities generated by multiple factors in a broad area and realizing the higher-precision image quality. A correction circuit 710 weight a sensitivity Pi corresponding to a pixel signal of each pixel related to correction in a pixel unit PU that is the correction target and a sensitivity Pi corresponding to a pixel signal of each pixel related to correction in at least one same color pixel unit PU and adjacent to the pixel unit PU that is the correction target by a weighting coefficient Wi. Consequently, the correction coefficient μ is calculated by dividing a sum of the weighted sensitivities by a total number n of pixels related to correction.

Color accuracy in an imaging device is improved.

An imaging element includes a plurality of pixels that acquires first information that is information of three primary colors and second information that is information of at least two colors different from the three primary colors and that includes at least one of complementary colors of the three primary colors.

Image data obtained by imaging of an imaging element capable of imaging a subject with sensitivity to a wavelength band of visible light and a wavelength band of near-infrared light via an optical system is acquired. A point image restoration process using a common restoration filter is performed on the image data of the subject captured with sensitivity to the wavelength band of the visible light by the imaging element and the image data of the subject captured with sensitivity to the wavelength band of the near-infrared light by the imaging element. The common restoration filter is calculated on the basis of average optical characteristics of the optical system obtained by performing weighted averaging of first optical characteristics with respect to the visible light of the optical system and second optical characteristics with respect to the near-infrared light of the optical system.

The present disclosure relates to an imaging apparatus, an imaging method, and a program that enable exposure control on a captured image in a non-Bayer pattern by an exposure control method designed for captured images in Bayer patterns.

When a Bayering process is performed on a captured image in an RGBW pixel array, a level correction unit corrects the signal level of the captured image so that an earlier level that is the signal level of each white pixel with the highest sensitivity in the captured image prior to the Bayering process becomes equal to a later level that is the signal level of each green pixel to be used in exposure control on an image in a Bayer pattern that is the RGB image after the Bayering process. The present disclosure can be applied to imaging apparatuses, for example.

A dual sensor imaging system and a privacy protection imaging method thereof are provided. The system is configured to control at least one color sensor and at least one IR sensor to respectively capture multiple color images and multiple IR images by adopting multiple exposure conditions adapted for an imaging scene, adaptively select a combination of the color image and the IR image that can reveal details of the imaging scene, detect a feature area with features of a target of interest in the color image, and fuse the color image and the IR image to generate a fusion image with the details of the imaging scene, and crop an image of the feature area of the fusion image to be replaced with an image not belonging to the IR image, so as to generate a scene image.

A per-pixel performance improvement is described for combined image sensor arrays that measure infrared and visible light. One embodiment is a method that includes forming an array of photodetectors on a silicon substrate, treating a subset of the photodetectors to improve sensitivity to infrared light, and finishing the photodetector array to form an image sensor.