Stemmer Imaging is distributing the FX4 HDR (High Dynamic Range) sensor from IDS, which is based on solar cell technology and allows imaging from scenes that simultaneously contain both very light and very dark areas, or where there are strong and unpredictable brightness fluctuations.
The sensor produces a logarithmic signal output. This enables fine differences in brightness to be imaged even in very bright scenes, without saturation, in a similar way to the human eye. Most of the USB and all of the GigE versions (HE, RE and SE) of the IDS uEye family of industrial cameras feature an FX4 HDR sensor version.
The FX4 HDR sensor features a patented pixel structure that provides a truly logarithmic output with effective suppression of fixed noise and gives a dynamic range of 120db. This equates to a 1,000 times greater brightness ratio (ratio of the highest brightness value to the lowest brightness value that can be imaged in a scene) compared to conventional linear CCD sensors, which typically have a dynamic range of 60db.
