Patent ID: 7463339

Claim:
A device for measuring the distance to far-off and close objects by which laser beams modulated and emitted by the device are reflected, comprising: a common objective for emitting the laser beams and for collecting rays which comprise laser beams reflected by the objects and background rays; means for selecting rays of a cohesive cross-sectional region of a bundle of collected rays, said means having an opening within which a first section and at least one second section are located, wherein laser beams reflected by a far-off object being coordinated with the first section and laser beams reflected by a close object being coordinated with the at least one second section and only a fraction of the collected laser beams reflected by the close object being selected via the second section; and a receiver for converting selected rays into a single electrical signal, by means of which the distance can be determined with the aid of the propagation velocity of optical rays, wherein the means are formed in such a way that the at least one second section has at least the dimension of the first section.