Patent ID: 6948659
Filing Date: 2005-09-27
Classification: G02B,G06K,H01S

Abstract:
1. A hand-supportable linear-type planar laser illumination and imaging (PLIIM) based device, comprising: a hand-supportable housing having a light transmission aperture; a support platform mounted within said hand-supportable housing; a linear image formation and detection (IFD) module mounted on said support platform, and having a linear array of image detection elements and also image formation optics having a field of view (FOV) projectable through said light transmission aperature and into an illumination and imaging field, definable external to said hand-supportable housing, and in which an object can be presented for illumination and imaging, and said FOV focusing a linear image of said object onto said linear array of image detection elements; and a pair of planar laser illumination arrays (PLIAs) aranged on opposite sides of said linear IFD module, and mounted on said support platform; wherein said pair of PLIAs produces a plurality spatially-incoherent planar laser illumination beam (PLIB) components that are optically combined with respect to other said PLIB components so as to produce a composite planar laser illumintaion beam (PLIB) that is spatially aligned with respect to said FOV and arranged in a co-planar relationship with at least a portion of said FOV; wherein each said PLIA includes a plurality of planar laser illumination modules (PLIMs), wherein each said PLIM includes a laser diode and beam focusing and diverging optics for producing one said spatially-incoherent PLIB component; wherein said composite PLIB produces a number of substantially different individual speckle noise patterns at said linear array of image detection elements during the photo-integration time period thereof; wherein the level of speckle noise power observed at said linear array of image detection elements is reduced through temporal averaging of said substantially different individual speckle noise patterns at said linear array of image detection elements during said photo-integration time period.