Patent ID: 7606485

Claim:
A stereo imager comprising a single image pickup device and a stereo imaging optical system including a bending member for bending a parallactic light beam from a subject and adapted to form on said single image pickup device at least two, mutually parallactic images in a left-and-right direction, wherein: said stereo imaging optical system includes left and right objective lenses having an identical shape and corresponding to said two parallactic images, and a single optical member located in front of said single image pickup device, wherein said optical member receives concurrently incident light beams from the same subject forming said at least two parallactic images via said left and right objective lenses, and has an identical optical action or function on each light beam, and a chief light ray of light beams incident from the same subject on said optical member via said left and right objective lenses are incident on said left and right objective lenses in such a way as to form an angle with respect to each of the respective optical axes of said left and right objective lenses, and each of said light beams enters said optical member and leaves said optical member for projection onto the upper and lower halves of a rectangular imaging plane, forming a parallactic image.