Patent ID: 7053941

Claim:
An image input apparatus comprising: a photoelectric conversion unit adapted to acquire image information of an object from a plurality of divided areas and to separately output signals from each of a plurality of channels, wherein each of the channels include a plurality of effective pixels and a plurality of non-image pixels; and a correcting unit adapted to correct offset components contained in the signals output from each of the channels during a period of acquiring the image information, in accordance with a first signal output from the plurality of effective pixels during a period other than the image information acquiring, a second signal output from the plurality of non-image pixels during the period other than the image information acquiring, and a third signal output from the plurality of non-image pixels during the period of acquiring image information, wherein said correcting unit includes: a subtracting unit adapted to subtract the offset components from the signals output from the plurality of channels of said photoelectric conversion unit during the period of acquiring the image information; a calculating unit adapted to calculate the fluctuation of the offset components in accordance with the second and third signals; and an adjusting unit adapted to adjust the offset components to be subtracted by said subtracting unit, in accordance with an output signal from said calculating unit.