(Tuesday, October 26, 2004 ) - PixeLINK today
announced an expansion of their product line of digital cameras with the launch of their
latest offering aimed at the microscopy documentation market. The new PL-A686 camera is a
digital camera with 6.6 megapixel resolution. It is one of the first dedicated microscopy
cameras in the world to offer this level of resolution without using expensive and slow
pixel shifting technology.
“We are very excited about the launch of the PL-A686 camera series,” says Kevin
Cooper, VP of Sales at PixeLINK. “The 6.6 megapixel resolution will exceed the needs
of most microscope applications, providing sharp high-quality images for publication or
archiving.”
Well suited to brightfield microscopy the PL-A686 camera is a perfect solution for
microscopy applications, such as pathology, where large quantities of images need to be
rapidly captured.
The PL-A686 will be shipped with the latest version of PixeLINK Capture, a full featured
image capture application with image annotation and measurement capabilities. PixeLINK
Capture allows the user to control the camera over the FireWire (IEEE-1394) interface and
saves captured images and AVI files directly to the computer’s hard disk.
The PL-A686 sensor is a 1” CMOS sensor with 3.5 µm square pixels providing a
resolution of 2208 x 3000 pixels in both color and monochrome versions. The 6.6 megapixel
resolution of the PL-A686 is complemented by controls to select a variable region of
interest and 5 levels of decimation. The camera delivers 5 frames per second at full
resolution with frame rates increasing for smaller regions of interest of decimation
modes. For examples, a 1600 x 1200 region of interest can be displayed at 17 frames per
second or a 648 x 480 region of interest can be displayed at up to 88 frames per second.
The five levels of decimation allow the full field of view to be used at lower resolutions
and higher frame rates. This permits users to preview the full field of view at a higher
frame rate for focusing and aiming and then capture images at the full resolution. The
camera also supports off-chip binning and averaging to effectively increase the pixel size
and provide high-quality images at lower resolutions.
PixeLINK products provide the best price for performance in the scientific and industrial
market.
Pixel shifting technology is used in some cameras to increase the resolution. The cameras
typically capture a number of images while shifting the position of the image sensor or
the lens between each picture. Software is then used to analyze the images and create a
much higher resolution picture. The process is expensive, requiring mechanical or
piezo-electric actuators, and slow as between 4 and 36 images must be captured and
processed to create one high-resolution result.
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