Patent ID: 7990465

Claim:
An imaging apparatus for electronically capturing an image of a subject, comprising: an optical system with a light amount adjustment function operable to focus light from a subject; an imaging unit operable to read an optical image of the subject that is formed with the light focused by the optical system, and obtain the read optical image as an image signal; a backlight correction unit operable to perform backlight correction of the image signal by performing tone conversion of converting a tone of a processing target pixel that is included in an image formed by the image signal using a conversion characteristic that is selected differently according to a spatial position of the processing target pixel in the image, wherein the tone conversion is performed in a manner to at least increase a luminance level of a dark image region of the image; an instruction unit operable to output an instruction signal instructing to start the backlight correction performed by the backlight correction unit; and a control unit operable to start the backlight correction based on the instruction signal output from the instruction unit, and adjust an amount of light in the optical system by decreasing an exposure light amount of the imaging unit by a predetermined amount.