Panoramic camera systems

摘要

One or more time delay and integration camera assemblies (A) are mounted in a housing (100) which is rotated by a motor (40, 106) relative to a vertical axis. A tachometer (44) monitors the rotation of the camera assembly about the axis and produces timing signals in accordance with the speed of rotation. Within each camera system, a zoom lens (10) focuses light from a field of view (12) on a light sensitive element array (14). A control circuit (24) is clocked by the timing signals to move vertical lines of data values (20) along the array (14) to a shift register (22). The shift register (22) an analog video processing circuit (32) converts the lines of data into an analog video signal. An analog-to-digital converter (62, 110) converts the analog video signal into digital pixel values which are stored in a panoramic memory (66). In the preferred embodiment in which the panoramic image represents 360 DEG of rotation, the panoramic memory stores an image representation that includes a series of vertical lines of data which span a full 360 DEG . With a light sensitive array which has 244 lines each with 600 elements and lens system that monitors a 0.1 DEG field of view, i.e. a field of view that spans 1/10th DEG along the horizon, the video signal is a series of vertical data lines with no frame breaks. About 880,000 vertical lines of data are generated in 360 DEG of rotation. Thus, the panoramic image memory stores an image which is about 880,000 x 600 pixels. A memory access circuit (70) and a scan converter (72) selectively withdraw portions of data from the panoramic memory to produce video signals that are converted into an array of different and selectable displays.