A planetary gear system includes a plurality of planet gears, each having a journal bearing and a pin, end supported in a planet carrier. Each pin has a small diameter central portion axially extending for end support. A larger diameter outer portion is integral with the central portion at an inboard merged zone, and has cantilever sections extending outboard from the merged zone. Each pin is sized such that bending of the merged zone in one direction is countered by bending of the cantilever se...

A plurality of storage pixels within each unit pixel are arranged successively so that signal electrons for each storage pixel are moved independently through the storage pixels. Signal electrons newly generated in a photosensitive pixel are added to relevant signal electrons among the signal electrons moved independently through the storage pixels. That is, signal electrons generated in the photosensitive pixel for each of highly relevant frames are superimposed in the same storage pixel and st...

Light from an object is incident to an image sensing device and converted into an image signal. The image sensing device is exposed to the light by a shutter, provided between the object and the solid-state image sensing device, for a first exposure period and a second exposure period that directly follows the first exposure period. The first and the second periods are the same length in time. Each exposure period for exposing the solid-state image sensing device to the light corresponds to one ...

An imaging apparatus for performing efficient signal processing depending on the operational mode. In the finder mode, a CCD interface 21a decimates horizontal components of image data supplied from an image generating unit 10 to one-third and moreover processes the decimated image data with data conversion and resolution conversion to produce Y, Cb and Cr image data which are routed to and written in an image memory 32 over a memory controller 22. In the recording mode, the CCD interface 21a ca...

A solid-state image pickup apparatus includes a color filter having an R (red), G (green) and B (blue) vertical stripe pattern. During preliminary pickup, a signal feeding section feeds particular drive signals for reading signal charges out of only odd-numbered columns or even-numbered columns. As a result, the signal charges or image data reduced to, e.g., one-half in the horizontal direction are transferred along a horizontal transfer path. The signal feeding section feeds horizontal drive si...

The present subject matter discloses devices, systems, and methodologies for harvesting power from environmentally induced vibrations. Piezoelectric devices (24) and structures are disclosed that may be employed in combination with electro-magnetic (100) or capacitive (92, 94) elements to enhance the power harvesting capabilities of the piezoelectric devices (24). The electromagnetic (100) and capacitive (92, 94) elements may be used to assist in maintaining system mechanical resonance in order ...

An electric power consumption and a quantity of generated heat can be reduced and hence a temperature characteristic can be maintained satisfactorily. A timing generator generates a smear gate pulse and a storage section driving pulse. The smear gate pulse is supplied to a smear gate region, whereby the smear gate region is opened during a vertical blanking period. The smear gate pulse and the storage section driving pulse are input to a gate circuit and an image section driving pulse is output ...

A driving method for a solid-state image sensing device includes the steps of: transferring signal charges generated at pixels (12) arranged in odd rows in the column upward direction through vertical transfer paths (13) each arranged for each column; temporarily accumulating the upward transferred signal charges for one field at a first accumulation region (14) and transferring the accumulated signal charges row by row in sequence for each field period through other vertical transfer paths (18)...

A solid state image device with a high frame rate, that can restrain image distortion etc. from taking place in case of filming of moving pictures or rapid filming and moreover can output signals excellent in the S/N proportion in a stable fashion, and a camera using it is provided. A frame memory apparatus having a plurality of memories respectively corresponding with respective pixels of a photoelectric conversion apparatus and an apparatus of recording signals of respective pixels of the phot...

An image pickup apparatus having a charge coupled device which comprises charge transfer channels having a photoelectric conversion function and a charge transfer function of the present invention has the structure that the charge transfer channels comprise transfer electrodes formed and arranged on a channel layer for transferring signal charges along with a charge transfer direction and a barrier layer formed on a part of the channel layer region underneath the transfer electrodes, and further...