Patent ID: 9258468
Filing Date: 2016-02-09
CPC Classification: G01J,G02B

Claim Text:
1. An optical device comprising: a) a light sensor comprising a first light sensing portion and a second light sensing portion; b) a first dichroic filter comprising a surface reflecting a first portion of incident light of a first wavelength band from a source along a first beam path through an imaging lens, and transmitting a second portion of incident light of a second wavelength band different from the first wavelength band from the source, the imaging lens projecting a first image of the source onto the first light sensing portion of the light sensor; c) a first mirror positioned nonparallel to the surface of the first dichroic filter and positioned to reflect the transmitted second portion of incident light along a second beam path through the imaging lens, the imaging lens projecting a second image of the source onto the second light sensing portion of the light sensor, and the second beam path intersecting the first beam path before passing through the imaging lens; d) a second mirror positioned to reflect and optically invert only one of the first portion of incident light reflected by the dichroic filter and the second portion of incident light transmitted by the dichroic filter, thereby causing only one of the first portion of incident light and the second portion of incident light to be incident on the light sensor in an inverted state, and the other of the first portion of incident light and the second portion of incident light to be incident on the light sensor in a non-inverted state; and e) an image processor in communication with the light sensor and receiving first image data from the first light sensing portion and second image data from the second light sensing portion, the image processor containing an algorithm to process the first image data into a first digital image of the source and the second image data into a second digital image of the source that is inverted with respect to the first digital image of the source, and to digitally invert one of the first digital image of the source and the second digital image of the source, thereby rendering the first digital image of the source non-inverted with respect to the second digital image of the source.