Assessment of the Performance of Staring Infrared Imaging Array Based on Microscanning Modes

Abstract

Staring infrared detector arrays, which sample a scene with pixels of finite size, generate images that are affected by aliasing and blurring caused by the sampling process. One potential method to reduce the effects of sampling is microscanning. In this paper, the sampling-averaging modulation transfer function at half the detector spatial cutoff frequency is introduced to be as a figure of merit to quantitatively assess microscanning image quality for selected cases of fill factor. Analytical results show that microscanning process can significantly reduce aliasing in the reconstructed image, and that the improvement of different modes of microscanning process to the reconstructed image quality is different, which is closely associated with fill factor. The microscan sampling and restoration imagery are also simulated with pixel interpolation method to qualitatively verify the reduction in aliasing with respect to typical microscanning mode (2×2, 3×3, 4×4 microscan) for the detector array of 100% and 50% fill factor respectively. And, the determining method of the optimum step number of microscanning needed is discussed for the staring imaging array with certain fill factor.