Patent ID: 7671888

Claim:
A stereoscopic-endoscope display control apparatus comprising: a stereoscopic endoscope including: left and right optical systems having a left and right parallax, left and right image forming optical systems respectively arranged on left and right optical axes along respective optical axes of the left and right optical systems, each of the left and right image forming optical systems forming an image of a same subject, and left and right image pickup devices arranged at respective image forming positions of the left and right image forming optical systems; left and right focusing optical systems for adjusting focal distance according to a distance from the left and right optical systems to the subject by being moved in conjunction with each other in the left and right optical axes directions, respectively, to focus and form respective images on the left and right image pickup devices; and a masking device for masking left and right video signals using electric masking signals on the basis of the focal distance information, the left and right video signals being generated from the left and right image pickup signals at a timing corresponding to the image pickup areas that are not picked up in common by both the left and right image pickup devices, wherein the left and right image pickup devices are fixed irrespective of movement of the left and right focusing optical systems, and the left and right areas masked by the masking device correspond to essentially symmetrical areas with respect to the left and right image pickup devices.