Patent ID: 7847229

Claim:
An object detecting system comprising: a light emitting mechanism which emits light toward an object occupying a vehicle seat and which is sectioned into a plurality of light emitting sections, wherein the light emitting sections have light emitting modes that are individually controlled; a control mechanism to control the light emitting mechanism; a photographing mechanism including an optical lens and a distance measuring image chip, wherein light emitted from the light emitting mechanism and reflected by the object is incident on the distance measuring image chip through the optical lens and is focused into a focusing area of the distance measuring image chip; and a processing mechanism to derive information about the object from a focused image on the distance measuring image chip of the photographing mechanism, wherein the light emitting modes of respective light emitting sections are each controlled such that incident light on the distance measuring image chip is equalized on a respective portion of the focusing area corresponding to the respective light emitting section.