INTEGRATED DIGITAL CAMERA PLATFORM WITH NIR APODIZATION FILTER FOR ENHANCED DEPTH SENSING & IMAGE PROCESSING

摘要

Digital visible light (RGB) cameras incorporating an NIR apodization filter having a gradual transmission for at least the NIR band. In some embodiments, the NIR apodization filter is incorporated into a camera module having a single aperture. The NIR apodization filter may effectively reduce the NIR aperture size relative to the RGB aperture size. In some embodiments, the different depth of field (DOF) associated with the different aperture sizes is employed to compute depth information for a scene (e.g., through a sharpness disparity function). In further embodiments, other image processing is based on the enhanced NIR information collected by a single-lens CM, or a multi-camera implementation where at least one CM of a multi-camera platform incorporates an NIR apodization filter.

主权项

1. A digital image capturing apparatus, comprising:
one or more camera hardware modules (CM), each including:
an near-infrared (NIR) apodization filter with a continuously varying transmission profile for the NIR band and a non-zero transmission profile for the visible light (RGB) band;an image sensor responsive within both the RGB and NIR bands; anda lens system including one or more lens coupled to provide an optical path between an aperture and the image sensor, the optical path including the NIR apodization filter; and a microprocessor coupled to the CM, the microprocessor including logic circuitry to:
receive input image data from the CM including at least RGB color information and NIR intensity information; andstore the NIR information to an electronic memory in association with an output image data frame including the RGB information.