Patent ID: 8001715

Claim:
An illumination apparatus comprising: a plurality of illumination sources, wherein enabled illumination sources of the plurality of illumination sources illuminate at one or more wavelengths; a housing, wherein the housing further includes a forward portion carrying the plurality of illumination sources; a controller, carried within the housing and coupled to the plurality of illumination sources, operable to selectively enable one or more illumination sources of the plurality of illumination sources, and wherein the controller is operable in a plurality of modes, each mode of the plurality of modes enabling for activation a selected one or more illumination sources of the plurality of illumination sources; an activation device, carried by the housing and coupled to the plurality of illumination sources, operable to activate illumination of one or more illumination sources of the plurality of illumination sources enabled for activation in a current mode of the controller from among the plurality of modes; means for modulating enabled illumination sources of the plurality of illumination sources at a plurality of frequencies in a selected mode of the controller from among the plurality of modes, wherein the plurality of frequencies includes a first frequency (f 1 ) modulated at a second frequency (f 2 ), wherein f 2 is swept over a range of frequencies between a first minimum frequency (f 2 min) and a first maximum frequency (f 2 max) at a rate determined by a third frequency (f 3 ), wherein f 3 is swept over a range of frequencies between a second minimum frequency (f 3 min) and a second maximum frequency (f 3 max).