Patent Application
20110261167
This application claims priority under 35 U.S.C. §119(a) to a Korean Patent Application filed in the Korean Intellectual Property Office on Apr. 21, 2010 and assigned Serial No. 10-2010-0037092, the contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference.
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a three-dimensional (3D) camera apparatus by which a first camera module and a second camera module are folded or unfolded through rotation and horizontally move in the unfolded state to adjust a distance therebetween.
2. Description of the Related Art
Generally, a “three-dimensional (3D) stereoscopic image” refers to an image in which depth and space formation information of a two-dimensional (2D) image are added to apply a stereoscopic effect to an object in the image.
The stereoscopic effect is generated by a disparity between a left-view image and a right-view image perceived by a human's two eyes, and the human perceives the images as a 3D stereoscopic image through the human brain's synthesis process of combining the two images. The cubic effect uses the generation of parallax between the eyes due to a distance of about 65 mm between the eyes when the eyes see the images oriented in two slightly different directions.
To capture a 3D stereoscopic image, two interworking cameras are required. When a conventional portable communication device has one camera module like a digital camera, a side image is captured and then another-side image is captured and they are synthesized to acquire a 3D image. However, if an object moves due to a difference between two capturing times, a desired 3D image cannot be acquired and a capturing region cannot remain the same, making it difficult to acquire the 3D image.
A conventional 3D camera apparatus includes a fixed 3D camera apparatus, which fixes a distance between two cameras and an adjustable 3D camera apparatus, which adjusts the distance between the two cameras.
As an object moves near, parallax between the two cameras' lenses increases, together with an increase of a non-overlapping region at an outer side of each of 3D captured regions of left and right captured screens. The non-overlapping region has an image loss, making it difficult to see.
The variable 3D camera apparatus developed to solve the foregoing image loss problem reconciles visual systems of left and right camera lenses in terms of in-focus distance, thereby achieving an excellent 3D effect while solving the image loss caused by the non-overlapping region.
As shown in
The lens adjusting unit 5 includes a gear portion 6 mounted on the cameras 3 and 4 and a motor 7 which rotates the gear portion 6.
However, the variable 3D camera apparatus 1 has to provide space to allow horizontal movement of the cameras 3 and 4 in the lens housing 2, limiting the space utilization of a product and hindering the slimness and miniaturization of the product due to size increase.
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However, the prisms 3b and 4b have to be precisely mounted in the cameras 3 and 4 along the optical axis direction D1, increasing the time required for the assembly process of the product and thus limiting the assembly efficiency of the product.
Therefore, there is a need for an 3D camera apparatus which folds or unfolds cameras by rotating to allow other parts to be mounted in a movement space provided in a camera and horizontally moves the cameras to adjust a distance between the cameras in the unfolded state.
An aspect of the present invention is to address at least the above problems and/or disadvantages and to provide at least the advantages described below. Accordingly, an aspect of the present invention is to provide a 3D camera apparatus by which a first camera module and a second camera module are folded or unfolded through rotation and horizontally move in the unfolded state to adjust a distance therebetween, allowing a plurality of other parts of the camera modules to be mounted in a movement space provided in a product and thus improving the space utilization of the product.
Another aspect of the present invention is to provide a 3D camera apparatus by which a first camera module and a second camera module are folded or unfolded through rotation and horizontally move in the unfolded state to adjust a distance therebetween, thereby removing a need for a movement space provided in an existing product and thus achieving a thinner and smaller product.
Moreover, another aspect of the present invention is to provide a 3D camera apparatus in which a plurality of camera lenses and a plurality of image sensors, without a plurality of prisms which have to be precisely mounted, are arranged along an optical axis, thereby improving the assembly precision and efficiency of the assembly process of a product and thus reducing an assembly time of the product.
According to an aspect of the present invention, there is provided a three-dimensional (3D) camera apparatus including a camera housing, a first camera module and a second camera module which are rotatably or movably coupled to the camera housing, are folded to or unfolded from the camera housing through rotation, and horizontally move in the unfolded state to adjust a distance therebetween, a driving unit provided in the camera housing to allow rotation or horizontal movement of the first camera module and the second camera module, and a guide movement portion provided in the camera housing to guide horizontal movement of the first camera module and the second camera module.
The above and other features and advantages of the present invention will be more apparent from the following detailed description taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which:
Embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings. The embodiment disclosed in the specification and structures shown in the drawings are merely exemplary of the present invention, and it should be understood that variations capable of substituting for the embodiment may exist at the time of filing the application.
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The 3D camera apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention is applicable to a digital camera as a representative example. However, the 3D camera apparatus may also be applied to various types of terminals such as a portable communication device, without being limited to a digital camera.
Examples of the digital camera or the portable communication device according to the present invention may include not only mobile communication terminals operating according to communication protocols corresponding to various communication systems, but also any information communication apparatuses and multimedia apparatuses such as Portable Multimedia Players (PMPs), MP3 players, game players, notebooks, advertisement boards, TVs, digital broadcasting players, Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs), smart phones, and so forth, and their application apparatuses.
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The driving motor 53 is provided in a center portion of the camera housing 20, and is engaged with the second gear portions 52 by means of the bevel gears 80.
The protection cover portion 70 is rotatably provided in the camera housing 20.
In this state, as shown in
At this time, power is applied to the driving motor 53 to rotate the driving motor 53, and the driving motor 53 then rotates the second gear portions 52 by means of the bevel gears 80.
In this case, as shown in
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In this state, a distance between the first camera module 30 and the second camera module 40 can be adjusted.
As such, by adjusting the distance between the first camera module 30 and the second camera module 40, the visual systems of the camera lenses 31 and 41 provided in the first camera module 30 and the second camera module 40 can reconcile the separate images, thereby solving an image loss problem caused by a non-overlapping region and providing a clear 3D image.
Moreover, other parts, for example, the driving motor 53, of the 3D camera apparatus 10 can be mounted in a movement space provided in the camera housing 20, thereby improving the space utilization of a product.
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In this state, the protection cover portion 70 is rotated to close the camera housing 20.
While the present invention has been shown and described with reference to certain embodiments thereof, it will be understood by those skilled in the art that various changes in form and details may be made therein without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention as defined by the appended claims.
| Number | Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10-2010-0037092 | Apr 2010 | KR | national |
