Patent ID: 6914701

Claim:
A digitizer for digitizing an image on a data medium, said digitizer comprising: a light sensitive element configured to be responsive to a light beam from an illuminator during a first exposure and during a second exposure, said first exposure and said second exposure being produced by controlling a time that said light sensitive element is responsive to said light beam, said first exposure associated with a first range of optical densities and said second exposure associated with a second range of optical densities of said image, said light sensitive element configured to produce a first set of analog signals associated with said first exposure and a second set of analog signals associated with said second exposure; an analog to digital converter configured to convert said first set of analog signals to a first set of digital signals and said second set of analog signals to a second set of digital signals, said first set of analog signals being produced by said light sensitive element during a first time interval that said light sensitive element is sensitive to said light beam, and said second set of analog signals being produced by said light sensitive element during a second time interval that said light sensitive element is sensitive to said light beam, wherein said second time interval is greater than said first time interval by a multiplication factor n, and wherein a boundary optical density between said first range of optical densities and said second range of optical densities is equal to Log(n); and a machine-readable medium comprising a first look up table and a second look up table, wherein said first look up table is configured to map said first set of digital signals to a first set of output signals associated with said first range of optical densities, and said second look up table is configured to map said second set of digital signals to a second set of output signals associated with said second range of optical densities.