Patent ID: 8493502

Claim:
An image pickup apparatus comprising: an image pickup unit; a light emission unit; an image acquisition unit configured to drive the image pickup unit and the light emission unit to acquire images continuously under a first photographic condition while the light emission unit is emitting no light, to acquire an image under a second photographic condition that is different from the first photographic condition while the light emission unit is emitting light, and to acquire an image under the second photographic condition except for a condition of the light emission unit while the light emission unit is emitting no light, at substantially the same view angle; a difference acquisition unit configured to acquire a luminance difference between the image acquired while the light emission unit is emitting light and one of the images acquired while the light emission unit is emitting no light; and an image composing unit configured to compose a composite image from the images acquired while the light emission unit is emitting no light and the image acquired while the light emission unit is emitting light, by changing transmission for each pixel, using the luminance difference acquired by the difference acquisition unit as transmission intensity data for each pixel.