Patent Document ID: 5481479
Application ID: 07988837
Patent Status: 1

Claim One:
1. A system for performing long range, sector scan panoramic electro-optical reconnaissance of a scene, the reconnaissance performed at increased scan velocities for a given ground resolved distance and forward overlap, comprising: (1) a focal plane array configured to detect an image of the scene and to convert said image into an electronic charge representation of said image; (2) a main electronics unit, coupled to said focal plane array, configured to convert said electronic charge representation into a digital image data signal, wherein said digital image data signal is a digital representation of said image; (3) focusing means, coupled to said focal plane array, for focusing a portion of the scene onto said focal plane array, wherein said portion of the scene is defined by a projection of said focal plane array; (4) determining means for determining a non-linear scan velocity; (5) scanning means. coupled to said focusing means for scanning said projection of said focal plane array across the scene at said non-linear scan velocity; and (6) processing means, coupled to said main electronics unit, for processing said digital image data signal to provide a visual image signal representing a corrected image, said corrected image having a pixel aspect ratio corrected to remove the effects of said non-linear scan velocity.