公开(公告)号：US20170353649A1

公开(公告)日：2017-12-07

申请号：US15616641

申请日：2017-06-07

Applicant: STMicroelectronics, Inc. ,  STMircroelectronics (Research & Development) Limited

Inventor： Xiaoyong Yang ,  John Kevin Moore

IPC: H04N5/235 ,  G01S17/10 ,  G01S17/02 ,  H04N5/225 ,  G01S7/486

CPC classification number: H04N5/2354 ,  G01S7/4815 ,  G01S7/4816 ,  G01S7/484 ,  G01S7/4863 ,  G01S7/4865 ,  G01S17/023 ,  G01S17/10 ,  H04N5/2256

Abstract: A flash control circuit of an image capture device includes a time-of-flight ranging sensor configured to sense distances to a plurality of objects within an overall field of view of the time-of-flight ranging sensor. The time-of-flight sensor is configured to generate a range estimation signal including a plurality of sensed distances to the plurality of objects. Flash control circuitry is coupled to the time-of-flight ranging sensor to receive the range estimation signal and is configured to generate a flash control signal to control a power of flash illumination light based upon the plurality of sensed distances. The time-of-flight sensor may also generate a signal amplitude for each of the plurality of sensed objects, with the flash control circuitry generating the flash control signal to the control the power of the flash illumination based on the plurality of sensed distances and signal amplitudes.