Solid-state image pickup apparatus with high- and low-sensitivity photosensitive cells, and an image shooting method using the same

摘要

A solid-state image pickup apparatus includes high-sensitivity photosensitive cells and low-sensitivity photosensitive cells alternating with each other in the horizontal and vertical directions. The color filter has first portions where red is assigned to the high-sensitivity photosensitive cells, second portions where blue is assigned to the low-sensitivity photosensitive cells, third portions where blue is assigned to the high-sensitivity and fourth portions where red is assigned to the low-sensitivity photosensitive cells. The apparatus is selectively operable in a progressive read mode for reading out signal charges from all of the photosensitive cells or a thin-out read mode for reading them out while thinning out the photosensitive cells. The thin-out read mode includes a mode for reading out signal charges from at least one of the first and second portions and a mode for reading them out from at least one of the third and fourth portions.