Patent ID: 7548264

Claim:
An image processing apparatus for picking up and processing an image, comprising: an image obtaining unit for obtaining a mosaic image by an image sensor having at least four kinds of filters with different spectral sensitivities, one of the at least four kinds of filters being used for each pixel of the mosaic image; and an image processing unit for generating a color image such that intensity information at a position of each pixel, the intensity information corresponding to a plurality of colors determined by the spectral sensitivities of the filters, is computed for all pixels of the mosaic image obtained by the image obtaining unit; wherein in a color filter arrangement of the image sensor of the image obtaining unit, filters possessed by pixels arranged in a checkered manner in half of all the pixels have at least one spectral characteristic having a strong correlation with a spectral characteristic of luminance; and wherein the image processing unit calculates estimated intensity values of colors possessed by the pixels arranged in the checkered manner at each pixel and calculates a luminance value of each pixel on a basis of the estimated intensity values; and wherein the color filter arrangement of the image sensor of the image obtaining unit further comprises: first filters corresponding to a first color having a spectral characteristic having a strong correlation with the spectral characteristic of luminance arranged horizontally and vertically in every other line; and second filters corresponding to a color different from the first color and having a spectral characteristic having a strong correlation with the spectral characteristic of luminance arranged horizontally and vertically in every other line and in lines different from lines of the first filter; and wherein the image processing unit further comprises; a first calculating unit for calculating a first estimated intensity value as an estimated intensity value of the first color at a position of a pixel of interest in the mosaic image; a second calculating unit for calculating a second estimated intensity value as an estimated intensity value of the second color at the position of the pixel of interest; and a synthesizing unit for synthesizing the first estimated intensity value calculated by the first calculating unit with the second estimated intensity value calculated by the second calculating unit.