Patent ID: 9554070
Date: 2017-01-24
CPC Classifications: H04N

Claim:
1. An imaging device, comprising: a solid-state imaging device configured to include a plurality of pixels, output a pixel signal according to an image of an imaged subject as input image data, and output a first clock signal which is a timing at which the input image data is output; a storage unit configured to store data; an imaging-processing unit configured to process the input image data output from the solid-state imaging device or image data stored in the storage unit; and a timing-generating unit configured to generate timings at which the solid-state imaging device and the imaging-processing unit operate, wherein in a first operation in which the imaging-processing unit processes the input image data output from the solid-state imaging device based on the timing of the solid-state imaging device, the timing-generating unit generates a first synchronization signal for driving the solid-state imaging device to output the generated first synchronization signal to the solid-state imaging device and output the first synchronization signal and a first clock signal input from the solid-state imaging device to the imaging-processing unit as the timing at which the imaging-processing unit operates, wherein in a second operation in which the imaging-processing unit processes the image data stored in the storage unit based on an internal timing of the imaging-processing unit, the timing-generating unit outputs a generated second synchronization signal and second clock signal to the imaging-processing unit as the timing at which the imaging-processing unit operates and does not output the first synchronization signal to the solid-state imaging device, wherein the timing-generating unit includes a synchronization signal-generating unit configured to generate the first synchronization signal in the first operation and generate the second synchronization signal in the second operation; a clock signal-generating unit configured to generate the second clock signal in the second operation; and a clock-selecting unit configured to select and output the first clock signal in the first operation and select and output the second clock signal in the second operation, wherein the synchronization signal-generating unit generates the second synchronization signal having different synchronization from the first synchronization signal, and the clock signal-generating unit generates the second clock signal having a different frequency from the first clock signal, wherein the imaging-processing unit further includes a processing unit configured to output data obtained by processing the input image data output from the solid-state imaging device or image data stored in the storage unit a data transfer unit configured to transfer the data output by the processing unit to the storage unit and a data-acquiring unit configured to acquire the image data stored in the storage unit, wherein the processing unit includes a pre-processing unit configured to output pre-processed image data obtained by pre-processing the input image data input from the solid-state imaging device, and the data transfer unit transfers the pre-processed image data to the storage unit, and wherein the pre-processing unit includes a line memory configured to hold an amount of input image data which is less than a data amount of the input image data of a first direction in the image and output the pre-processed image data obtained by pre-processing part of the input image data of the image divided within a range of a data amount of the input image data capable of being held by the line memory, the data transfer unit includes a first transfer unit configured to transfer the pre-processed image data to the storage unit, and a second transfer unit configured to transfer the remaining input image data of the first direction in the image which has not been pre-processed by the pre-processing unit as original image data to the storage unit, the data-acquiring unit acquires the original image data stored in the storage unit, and the image-processing unit further includes a selecting unit configured to output the input image data input from the solid-state imaging device or the original image data acquired by the data-acquiring unit to at least one of the pre-processing unit and the second data transfer unit.