We report the useful approach toward the practical imaging solution for long-wavelength infrared (LWIR). In order to make use of the LWIR sensors conveniently in everyday life, the imaging module needs to be slim and small so that it can be mounted inside end-user devices without big difficulties. At the same time, the image qualities should have a sufficient level to guarantee that people can easily identify object shapes and recognize temperature differences when they see the resultant images. In this paper, we focus on those two crucial points for the practical LWIR imaging device. First, to make the compact optical system, we adopted a thin meta-surface lens of a focal length 2 mm which is showing the effective total top length (TTL) less than 3 mm. Second, to enhance the image sharpness degraded relatively due to the lens, the deep learning method of the U-net model is introduced. The patterns of the USAF resolution target chart indicate the increase of modulation value by 3~8 times after applying the learning process. We believe that our work helps to expand the pragmatic application area of the LWIR imaging sensors in the near future.
A time-of-flight (TOF) based three dimensional (3D) image capturing system and its enhanced optical modulating device are presented. The 3D image capturing system includes 850nm IR emitter (typically compact Laser diodes) and high speed image modulator, so called optical shutter. The optical shutter consists of multi-layered optical resonance cavity and electro-absorptive layers. The optical shutter is a solid-state controllable filter which modulates the IR image to extract the phase delay due to TOF of the emitting IR light. This presentation especially addresses robustness issues and solutions when operated under practical environments such as ambient temperature variation and existence of strong ambient light (e.g. outdoors). The wavelength of laser diode varies substantially depending on the ambient temperature, which degrades the modulation efficiency. To get a robust operation, the bandwidth of transmittance of the optical shutter is drastically improved with a novel coupled Fabry-Perot resonance cavity design to come up with the wavelength variation of the laser diode. Also, to suppress the interference of solar irradiance to IR source signal, a novel driving scheme is applied, in which IR light and optical shutter modulation duties are timely localized, i. e. ‘bursted’. Suggested novel optical shutter design and burst driving scheme enable capturing of a full HD resolution of depth image under the realistic usage environments, which so far tackle the commercialization of TOF cameras. Design, fabrication, and evaluation of the optical shutter; and, 3D capturing system prototype, image test results are presented.
A 20-MHz switching high-speed light-modulating device for three-dimensional (3-D) image capturing and its system prototype are presented. For 3-D image capturing, the system utilizes a time-of-flight (TOF) principle by means of a 20-MHz high-speed micromachined electro-absorptive modulator, the so-called optical shutter. The high-speed modulation is obtained by utilizing the electro-absorption mechanism of the multilayer structure, which has an optical resonance cavity and light-absorption epilayers grown by metal organic chemical vapor deposition process. The optical shutter device is specially designed to have small resistor–capacitor–time constant to get the high-speed modulation. The optical shutter is positioned in front of a standard high-resolution complementary metal oxide semiconductor image sensor. The optical shutter modulates the incoming infrared image to acquire the depth image. The suggested novel optical shutter device enables capturing of a full high resolution-depth image, which has been limited to video graphics array (VGA) by previous depth-capturing technologies. The suggested 3-D image sensing device can have a crucial impact on 3-D–related business such as 3-D cameras, gesture recognition, user interfaces, and 3-D displays. This paper presents micro-opto-electro-mechanical systems-based optical shutter design, fabrication, characterization, 3-D camera system prototype, and image evaluation.
We suggest a Time-of-Flight (TOF) video camera capturing real-time depth images (a.k.a depth map), which are generated from the fast-modulated IR images utilizing a novel MOEMS modulator having switching speed of 20 MHz. In general, 3 or 4 independent IR (e.g. 850nm) images are required to generate a single frame of depth image. Captured video image of a moving object frequently shows motion drag between sequentially captured IR images, which results in so called ‘motion blur’ problem even when the frame rate of depth image is fast (e.g. 30 to 60 Hz). We propose a novel ‘single shot’ TOF 3D camera architecture generating a single depth image out of synchronized captured IR images. The imaging system constitutes of 2x2 imaging lens array, MOEMS optical shutters (modulator) placed on each lens aperture and a standard CMOS image sensor. The IR light reflected from object is modulated by optical shutters on the apertures of 2x2 lens array and then transmitted images are captured on the image sensor resulting in 2x2 sub-IR images. As a result, the depth image is generated with those simultaneously captured 4 independent sub-IR images, hence the motion blur problem is canceled. The resulting performance is very useful in the applications of 3D camera to a human-machine interaction device such as user interface of TV, monitor, or hand held devices and motion capturing of human body. In addition, we show that the presented 3D camera can be modified to capture color together with depth image simultaneously on ‘single shot’ frame rate.
20 Mega-Hertz-switching high speed image shutter device for 3D image capturing and its application to system
prototype are presented. For 3D image capturing, the system utilizes Time-of-Flight (TOF) principle by means of
20MHz high-speed micro-optical image modulator, so called 'optical shutter'. The high speed image modulation is
obtained using the electro-optic operation of the multi-layer stacked structure having diffractive mirrors and optical
resonance cavity which maximizes the magnitude of optical modulation. The optical shutter device is specially designed
and fabricated realizing low resistance-capacitance cell structures having small RC-time constant. The optical shutter is
positioned in front of a standard high resolution CMOS image sensor and modulates the IR image reflected from the
object to capture a depth image. Suggested novel optical shutter device enables capturing of a full HD depth image with
depth accuracy of mm-scale, which is the largest depth image resolution among the-state-of-the-arts, which have been
limited up to VGA. The 3D camera prototype realizes color/depth concurrent sensing optical architecture to capture
14Mp color and full HD depth images, simultaneously. The resulting high definition color/depth image and its capturing
device have crucial impact on 3D business eco-system in IT industry especially as 3D image sensing means in the fields
of 3D camera, gesture recognition, user interface, and 3D display. This paper presents MEMS-based optical shutter
design, fabrication, characterization, 3D camera system prototype and image test results.
KEYWORDS: Signal to noise ratio, Retinal scanning, Retina, In vivo imaging, Optical coherence tomography, Motion measurement, Cameras, Standards development, Eye
We present pulsed illumination spectral-domain optical coherence tomography (SD-OCT) for in vivo human retinal imaging. We analyze the signal-to-noise (SNR) for continuous wave (CW) and pulsed illumination SD-OCT. The lateral beam scan motion is responsible for a SNR drop due to lateral scanning induced interference fringe washout. Pulsed illumination can reduce the SNR drop by shorter sample illumination time during the integration time of a camera. First, we demonstrate the SNR benefit of pulsed illumination over CW as function of lateral scan speed for a paper sample. For in-vivo human retinal imaging with pulsed illumination, the maximum permissible exposure (MPE) according to pulse repetition rate is presented based on ANSI standard. Finally, we show better SNR in retinal images of a normal subject with pulsed illumination SD-OCT over CW at high lateral scanning speed.
This paper describes a newly designed multipoint process monitoring system based on an acousto-optic tunable filter. In order to prove the feasibility of the suggested multipoint monitoring system for use in the NIR spectral region, some experiments were carried out in the visible range. The multipoint process monitoring system consists of an AOTF device for wavelength selecting, a CCD imaging sensor, and a specially designed in-line type of optical fiber probe. Unlike an FTS (Fourier Transform Spectrometry) based monitoring system, an AOTF has no moving parts, and it can be rapidly tuned to any wavelength in its operating range within microseconds. Thus, the AOTF is advantageous in terms of faster spectral imaging capability and rigidity required for industrial monitoring environment. Also, Fourier Transform Spectrometry experiments were conducted for comparison with the AOTF based monitoring system. In the current feasibility evaluation, an enhanced optical fiber probe with 3 monitoring points was used. However, the number of monitoring points can be easily expanded to dozens more points as required.
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