Photonis color night imaging sensor wins prestigious award

Photonis (Brive, France) has received the 2015 Ingénieur Général Chanson Award for its Kameleon day-to-night color imaging sensor. The award is an annual innovation prize from the French Armament Association that honors companies and individuals whose innovations contribute to significant operational improvements in land defense systems.

The award was officially presented to Photonis on June 2, 2015, by General Bosser, French Army Chief of Staff, to Geoffroy Deltel, the company's CTO, and his colleague Damien Letexier for the Kameleon color sensor, which can detect and project images in color at night level 1 (full moon). To date, conventional night vision imaging systems can only detect monochrome (black/white) images under similar lighting conditions. The sensor uses a complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) sensor similar to mobile phones, which in itself cannot distinguish colors. To identify color, Kameleon uses a patented innovation where two raw images and a reconstruction algorithm reproduce the final image in color in real time.

The Kameleon technology is currently being tested in applications such as Special Forces' stealth surveillance, digital day and night weapon sights, vehicle situational awareness, driver vision enhanced systems, helicopter pilot helmets, and on drones (UAVs). It facilitates Identification Friend-Foe (IFF), target identification, and identification of danger zones. An added advantage of Kameleon is its use in daylight and night, up to night level 3 (quarter moon with cloud cover). In lower light levels, the sensor will revert visible images to black and white.

Kameleon is part of the Nocturn range of day and night sensors, camera cores, and equipment that provide day and night imaging for security and defense applications, and is developed by the company's Digital Imaging division.

SOURCE:Photonis