Patent Document ID: 20070206096
Application ID: 11477802
Patent Status: 0

Claim One:
1. An image acquiring apparatus comprising: sample storage means for storing a plurality of samples; macro image acquiring means for acquiring a macro image of the sample; micro image acquiring means for acquiring a micro image while scanning the sample with higher resolution than that of the macro image; and control means including macro image acquisition control means for controlling an operation to acquire the macro image by the macro image acquiring means, image pickup condition setting means for setting an image pickup condition for the micro image with reference to the macro image, and micro image acquisition control means for controlling an operation to acquire the micro image by the micro image acquiring means; wherein the control means has a semi-automatic mode serving as a control mode, and wherein, in the semi-automatic mode, the macro image acquisition control means performs control to place each of the samples from a storage position in the sample storage means at an image acquiring position for the macro image acquiring means so as to acquire the macro image, and then performs control to place the sample at a standby position; the image pickup condition setting means sets the image pickup condition for the micro image while allowing an operator to confirm the macro image and the corresponding image pickup condition with respect to the sample the macro image of which has been acquired; and the micro image acquisition control means performs control to place the sample from the standby position and for which the image pickup condition has been set at an image acquiring position for the micro image acquiring means, and performs control to acquire the micro image with reference to the image pickup condition.