Patent ID: 8614752

Claim:
An electronic still camera, comprising: an image-capturing device that captures a subject image through a taking lens; a subsampling circuit that subsamples an image-capture signal output from the image-capturing device and reads out subsampled image-capture signals; a digital signal processor that performs image pretreatment on each of the subsampled image-capture signals subsampled by the subsampling circuit to form pretreated image data; a memory that stores a brightness signal Y and color difference signals R-Y, B-Y in the pretreated image data; a first signal processing circuit that performs first edge enhancement on all of the subsampled image-capture signals subsampled by the subsampling circuit; a second signal processing circuit that performs additional enhancement processing that is a second edge enhancement on the first edge-enhanced subsampled image-capture signal subjected to the first edge enhancement by the first signal processing circuit; an area selection circuit that divides a photographic field of the subject image captured by the image-capturing device into a plurality of areas and selects a specific area therefrom according to an input operation by a user; a control circuit that sets the first signal processing circuit and the second signal processing circuit in an on-state or an off-state in correspondence to photographing conditions; and a brightness detection circuit that detects the brightness of the subject image, wherein: the first edge enhancement is performed on an image data corresponding to the specific area selected by the area selection circuit, the second edge enhancement further emphasizes a portion of the subsampled image-capture signal subjected to the first edge enhancement, the portion having a contrast higher than a specific value, the first and the second signal processing circuits, in respective edge enhancement operations, output a brightness signal achieved by adding the differentiated signal to an original brightness signal and color difference signals R-Y and B-Y whose levels are set to zero when the differentiated brightness signal obtained from the brightness signal Y is higher than a predetermined value or the brightness signal achieved by adding the differentiated signal to an original brightness signal and original color difference signals R-Y and B-Y that are read out from the memory when the differentiated brightness signal obtained from the brightness signal Y is lower than the predetermined level, and the control circuit turns off the first processing circuit and the second signal processing circuit when a detection value obtained by the brightness detection circuit is equal to or less than a specific value.