Patent ID: 7223955
Filing Date: 2007-05-29
Classification: H04N

Abstract:
1. An imaging device, comprising: a solid-state imaging element comprising: a semiconductor substrate; a plurality of photoelectric conversion elements forming a square lattice pattern extending in a column direction and in a row direction, wherein the square lattice pattern comprises a plurality of sets, each comprising a subset of said photoelectric conversion elements arranged in one of the column direction and the row direction, on a surface of the semiconductor substrate; a vertical transfer section that transfers to the column direction an electric charge from said photoelectric conversion elements, to form an electric charge from the vertical transfer section; a horizontal transfer section that transfers to the row direction the electric charge from the vertical transfer section, to form an electric charge transferred from the horizontal transfer section; and an output section that outputs a signal corresponding to the electric charge transferred from the horizontal transfer section, wherein the subsets of said photoelectric conversion elements comprise: a plurality of first photoelectric conversion elements that store a first signal electric charge, the first signal electric charge being used for obtaining an image signal having a comparatively higher sensitivity; and a plurality of second photoelectric conversion elements that store a second signal electric charge, the second signal electric charge being used for obtaining an image signal having a comparatively lower sensitivity, wherein the vertical transfer section comprises: a plurality of vertical transfer channels in the semiconductor substrate, each of the vertical transfer channels corresponding to each of the subsets of said photoelectric conversion elements arranged in the column direction; a plurality of vertical transfer electrodes arranged to substantially cross the vertical transfer channels when viewed from a vertical direction to a plane of the semiconductor substrate; and a plurality of electric charge reading regions that read out to the vertical transfer channels, the electric charge from said photoelectric conversion elements, wherein each of said photoelectric conversion elements corresponds to one of the vertical transfer electrodes, wherein the plurality of the electric charge reading regions comprise: wherein said imaging device further comprises: an exposure time control section that changes an exposure time of the first photoelectric conversion elements and an exposure time of the second photoelectric conversion elements; and a signal processing section that processes a signal on the basis of an imaging signal output from the solid-state imaging element, wherein signal processing to be performed by the signal processing section includes merging operation for generating a composite signal of a high sensitivity image signal originating from a signal output from the first photoelectric conversion element and a low sensitivity image signal originating from a signal output from the second photoelectric conversion element, and wherein the exposure time control section determines a type of a photographing scene and changes the exposure time of the first photoelectric conversion element and the exposure time of the second photoelectric conversion element by making a timing at which an electric charge is to be read to the vertical transfer channels from the first photoelectric conversion elements different from a timing at which an electric charge is to be read to the vertical transfer channels from the second photoelectric conversion elements.