Patent ID: 7609306

Claim:
A solid-state image pickup apparatus comprising: a plurality of photosensitive cells bidimensionally arranged in a photosensitive array on which incident light is condensed for convening the incident light to signal charges; a color filter assigned to said plurality of photosensitive cells for separating the incident light to red, green and blue, which are three primary colors; a driver for causing the signal charges output from said plurality of photosensitive cells to be transferred at a timing in response to a drive signal, said plurality of photosensitive cells comprising first photosensitive cells with a first photoelectric conversion sensitivity characteristic and second photosensitive cells with a second photoelectric conversion sensitivity characteristic lower than the first photoelectric conversion sensitivity, said first and second photosensitive cells alternating with each other in a horizontal direction and a vertical direction of a bidimensional arrangement; said color filter comprising first portions where red is assigned to said first photosensitive cells, second portions where blue is assigned to said second photosensitive cells, third portions where blue is assigned to said first photosensitive cells and fourth portions where red is assigned to said second photosensitive cells; a mode selector For designating, among modes in which the signal charges are read out from said plurality of photosensitive cells, at least either one of a progressive read mode for reading out signal charges from all of said plurality of photosensitive cells and a thin-out read mode for reading out signal charges while thinning out said plurality of photosensitive cells; and a drive signal generator for generating the drive signal in accordance with the mode designated by said mode selector and feeding the drive signal to a circuit selected; said thin-out read mode comprising a first mode for reading out signal charges from said first portions and said second portions, and a second mode for reading out signal charges from said third portions and said fourth portions.