Patent ID: 8188412

Claim:
A confocal microscope, comprising: an objective lens for converging light, which is output from a light source, to a sample; a scanning mechanism for relatively scanning the sample with the light converged to the sample; a focus moving unit for relatively moving a light-gathering position of the objective lens and a position of the sample along a direction of an optical axis of the converged light; a plurality of confocal diaphragm apertures that are arranged at positions optically conjugate to the light-gathering position of the objective lens and have different diaphragm diameters; a plurality of photodetectors for detecting intensities of lights respectively transmitting through the plurality of confocal diaphragm apertures; a weighting/combining arithmetic processing unit for combining signals respectively output from the plurality of photodetectors after weighting the signals; a brightness/height information calculating unit for calculating omnifocal brightness information and height information of the sample based on a signal resulting from an arithmetic operation of the weighting/combining arithmetic processing unit; a weight ratio setting unit for setting at least two mutually different ratios; and a displaying unit for displaying a plurality of pieces of omnifocal brightness information calculated by the brightness/height information calculating unit on one screen; wherein the weighting/combining arithmetic processing unit combines the plurality of signals after weighting the signals for each of the two or more ratios set by the weight ratio setting unit; and wherein the brightness/height information calculating unit calculates the omnifocal brightness information respectively for the plurality of signals resulting from an arithmetic operation of the weighting/combining arithmetic processing unit.