Tokyo Institute of Technology announced that it has succeeded in developing an imaging system that can simultaneously capture color images and near-infrared images with a single image pickup device in collaboration with Olympus.As a next-generation image sensing technology, it is expected to be applied to a wide range of fields such as security, robotics, agriculture, and medical care.
Digital cameras that are currently in widespread use use imaging technology that uses a single-panel image sensor and a color filter array (CFA). The data obtained through CFA becomes mosaic data, and a full-color image is generated by interpolating the mosaic-like data and performing "demosaiking processing" to generate a full image, color correction, and the like.
On the other hand, as the trend of applying image processing technology increases, there is a desire to acquire color images and near-infrared images at the same time. Security measures that are used at the same time are expected.However, current cameras can only capture either color or near-infrared images.
Therefore, in this research, we developed a prototype of a new imaging system by proposing a new CFA placement and demosiking process.By adding a near-infrared filter called "N" to the CFA, which was previously only R, G, and B, simultaneous shooting of color and near-infrared images is realized. An image sensor equipped with a CFA that has a near-infrared filter. And an image processing system.In the image system, processing such as demoizing and color correction can be performed at the same time, and color images and near-infrared images can be output to the display in real time.
In the future, it is said that it will design the system for practical use and develop the camera module to develop the application.This prototype system will be demonstrated and exhibited at the "6nd Image Sensing Symposium" (Yokohama) and "22th IEEE Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition" (USA) held in June.
