Patent ID: 8462209

Claim:
A dual-swath imaging system comprising: a pair of twin photogrammetric CCD cameras mounted on a remote sensing platform adjacent to each other; a first of said twin photogrammetric CCD cameras comprises a first CCD imager and a nadir pointing first large format optical lens that is capable of imaging an extended panoramic rectangular area with a width twice as wide as that of said CCD imager of said twin cameras; a first lens shift mount attached between a body of said first of said twin photogrammetric CCD cameras and said first large format optical lens for physically shifting said first large format optical lens to a predetermined point x left with respect to said first CCD imager, to make said predetermined point x left be on a focal point said first large format optical lens; a second of said twin photogrammetric CCD cameras is symmetrically mounted on said platform adjacent to said first of said twin photogrammetric CCD cameras, said second of said twin photogrammetric CCD cameras comprises a second CCD imager and a nadir pointing second large format optical lens that are made the same as said corresponding first CCD imager and said first large format optical lens; a second lens shift mount being mounted the same with the shift mirrored relative to the first lens shift mount and attached between a body of said second of said twin photogrammetric CCD cameras and said second large format optical lens for shifting the focal point of said second large format optical lens a mirrored reference point x right with respect to said second CCD imager to form a symmetrical focal point x right ; said first of said twin photogrammetric CCD cameras comprises said first CCD imager shifted to a predetermined right side location and orientation of the focal point of said first large format optical lens for capturing a left scene image on a left side of said twin CCD cameras; said second of said twin photogrammetric CCD cameras comprises said second CCD imager shifted to a predetermined left side location and orientation of the focal point of said second large format optical lens for capturing a right scene image on a right side of said twin CCD cameras; and a first principal axis of said first large format optical lens and a second principal axis of said second large format optical lens being aligned in parallel for obtaining a panorama from said left scene image and said right scene image.