Compensation method for the image motion of a rotary-scan space camera

Abstract

Space-borne observation using optical detection requires wide-area and high-resolution imaging. We propose and demonstrate a novel rotary-scan space camera for remote sensing. The camera has a 2-m resolution and it is designed with an extra-wide swath of 1000 km and a wide image motion range. The motion range is achieved with the inclination and rotation of the optical axis. To avoid image blurring, an opto-mechanical method using a 2D fast steering mirror and a timely rotating detector is proposed to compensate for the rotary-scan image motion, which is over 200 pixels and spatial-variant. Finally, a physical simulation was conducted where the image motion was reduced from 20 pixels to less than 1 pixel with more than 95% compensation, validating the efficiency of the image motion compensation scheme and the feasibility of the rotary-scan imaging mode.