Patent ID: 7375747

Claim:
A solid-state image pickup device driving method of reading out from a solid-state image pickup device image information of at least one image extraction target area set in an image pickup area of the solid-state image pickup device, comprising: a line transfer step of vertically transferring signal charges of each of photosensitive pixels arranged in a matrix form in the image pickup area by plural vertical shift registers, and transferring the signal charges from the plural vertical shift registers to a horizontal shift register line by line; and a horizontal transfer step of horizontally transferring the signal charges transferred to the horizontal shift register, wherein with respect to plural extraction target lines which are traverse over the image extraction target area and each of which comprises an extraction target section corresponding to an overlap portion with the image extraction target area, a preceding section preceding to the extraction target section and a subsequent section subsequent to the extraction target section, the horizontal transfer step is stopped while leaving the signal charges of a hold section corresponding to at least a part of the subsequent section in the horizontal shift register, the vertical transfer step vertically transfers a subsequent extraction target line to the horizontal shift register in which the signal charges of the hold section of a preceding extraction target line remain at the head portion, and a length of the hold section is determined on the basis of a length of shorter one of the subsequent section of the preceding extraction target line and the preceding section of the subsequent extraction target line.