A solid-state imaging device includes a semiconductor substrate; and a pixel unit having a plurality of pixels on the semiconductor substrate, wherein the pixel unit includes first pixel groups having two or more pixels and second pixel groups being different from the first pixel groups, wherein a portion of the pixels in the first pixel groups and a portion of the pixels in the second pixel groups share a floating diffusion element.

There is provided an imaging device including a pixel array section including pixel units two-dimensionally arranged in a matrix pattern, each pixel unit including a photoelectric converter, and a plurality of column signal lines disposed according to a first column of the pixel units. The imaging device further includes an analog to digital converter that is shared by the plurality of column signal lines.

There is provided an imaging device including a pixel array section including pixel units two-dimensionally arranged in a matrix pattern, each pixel unit including a photoelectric converter, and a plurality of column signal lines disposed according to a first column of the pixel units. The imaging device further includes an analog to digital converter that is shared by the plurality of column signal lines.

A multi-aperture imaging system comprising a first camera with a first sensor that captures a first image and a second camera with a second sensor that captures a second image, the two cameras having either identical or different FOVs. The first sensor may have a standard color filter array (CFA) covering one sensor section and a non-standard color CFA covering another. The second sensor may have either Clear or standard CFA covered sections. Either image may be chosen to be a primary or an auxiliary image, based on a zoom factor. An output image with a point of view determined by the primary image is obtained by registering the auxiliary image to the primary image.

An image sensor includes a photodiode array and a color filter array optically aligned with the photodiode array. The photodiode array includes a plurality of photodiodes disposed within respective portions of a semiconductor material. The color filter array includes a plurality of color filters arranged to form a plurality of tiled minimal repeating units. Each minimal repeating unit includes at least a first color filter with a red spectral photoresponse, a second color filter with a yellow spectral photoresponse, and a third color filter with a panchromatic spectral photoresponse.

A solid-state imaging device includes a semiconductor substrate; and a pixel unit having a plurality of pixels on the semiconductor substrate, wherein the pixel unit includes first pixel groups having two or more pixels and second pixel groups being different from the first pixel groups, wherein a portion of the pixels in the first pixel groups and a portion of the pixels in the second pixel groups share a floating diffusion element.

An image sensing apparatus including a pixel array comprising two or more photo-sensor elements, a first optical filter disposed on a first photo-sensor element of the pixel array and a second optical filter disposed on a second photo-sensor element of the pixel array. The first optical filter is configured such that a spectral response of the first optical filter includes a first passband in a first wavelength range and a second passband in a second wavelength range, where the first passband and the second passband are separated by a first stop band. The second optical filter is configured such that a spectral response of the second optical filter includes a third passband in the first wavelength range and a fourth passband in the second wavelength range, where the third passband and the fourth passband are separated by a second stop band.

An imaging system has an imager comprising a plurality of jots. A readout circuit is in electrical communication with the imager. The readout circuit can be configured to facilitate the formation of an image by defining neighborhoods of the jots, wherein a local density of exposed jots within a neighborhood is used to generate a digital value for a pixel of the image.

An imaging device including an electronic shutter and a pixel array with color pixels with different characteristics of spectral sensitivity arranged. The pixel array part has at least one clear pixel, the plurality of color pixels including at least two of (i) a first color filter pixel having a peak of spectral sensitivity characteristics for red, (ii) a second color filter pixel having a peak for blue, and (iii) a third color filter pixel having a peak for green. The clear pixel has a high transmittance arranged in an oblique pixel array system at a given position of a given row and a given column with respect to the first color filter pixel, the second color filter pixel, and the third color filter pixel. An electronic shutter is separately driven for the at least one clear pixel and for the plurality of color filter pixels.

A multi-aperture imaging system comprising a first camera with a first sensor that captures a first image and a second camera with a second sensor that captures a second image, the two cameras having either identical or different FOVs. The first sensor may have a standard color filter array (CFA) covering one sensor section and a non-standard color CFA covering another. The second sensor may have either Clear or standard CFA covered sections. Either image may be chosen to be a primary or an auxiliary image, based on a zoom factor. An output image with a point of view determined by the primary image is obtained by registering the auxiliary image to the primary image.