Patent ID: 7679666

Claim:
An image-sensing apparatus comprising: a photoelectric conversion portion having a photosensitive element producing an electric signal in accordance with amount of incident light and a first transistor having a first electrode connected to the photosensitive element, a second electrode, and a control electrode, the photoelectric conversion portion outputting the electric signal output from the photosensitive element and converted natural-logarithmically by making the first transistor operate in a subthreshold region; a lead-out path by way of which the electric signal output from the photoelectric conversion portion is fed to an output signal line; and a controller that performs image sensing by feeding a first voltage to the second electrode of the first transistor so as to make the first transistor operate in the subthreshold region, wherein the controller, by feeding a second voltage to the second electrode of the first transistor, permits a larger current to flow through the first transistor than before feeding the second voltage thereto.