Patent ID: 7944466

Claim:
An endoscope apparatus comprising: an endoscope comprising an imaging device that forms a color image signal of a body to be observed; a storage portion that stores matrix data for forming a spectral image based on the color image signal; a spectral image-forming circuit that conducts matrix calculation based on the color image signal by using the matrix data of the storage portion and forms at least one spectral image signal each of which corresponds to an arbitrarily selected wavelength range; and an amplifier circuit that amplifies said at least one spectral image signal formed by the spectral image-forming circuit, wherein the color image signal from the imaging device is selectably: (i) passed through the spectral image-forming circuit to form said at least one spectral image signal; or (ii) not passed through the spectral image-forming circuit to form an ordinary color image signal for an ordinary display, and wherein the endoscope apparatus further comprises a noise removal circuit for removing noise of the ordinary color image signal or said at least one spectral image signal, and the noise removal circuit conducts noise processing for said at least one spectral image signal at a first noise removal rate and conducts noise processing for the ordinary color image signal at a second noise removal rate, the first noise removal rate being higher than the second noise removal rate.