A single ball lens-based hybrid biomimetic fish eye/compound eye imaging system.

A hybrid biomimetic imaging system combining the advantages of a fish eye and a compound eye is proposed. It uses a single ball lens as objective lens followed by an array of microcameras, which makes it possible to achieve high resolution in a wide field of view (FOV). Unlike conventional monocentric designs, a single ball lens is enough for the purpose of intermediate imaging. Its geometric aberrations are rather big but still able to be corrected by the subsequent microcameras with ordinary spherical lenses. Optomechanical design of the imaging system is presented and the alignment tolerance is easily guaranteed by machining fitting elements on an integrative housing assembly. Imaging performance of the single ball lens-based system is experimentally verified to be comparable with that of conventional two-shell objective-based system. Moreover, its microcamera has larger FOV which facilitates the extension of FOV with overlap between sub-images. Finally, a row of 9microcameras and 3 × 3 array of microcameras are integrated to capture and then stitch sub-images for wide FOV imaging with high resolution. • Hybrid biomimetic design combining a fish eye and a compound eye. • A single ball lens used as objective lens followed by an array of microcameras. • Optomechanical design facilitating assembly without laborious adjustment. • Imaging performance comparable with conventional monocentric design. • Extended FOV with high resolution achieved by stitching 9 sub-images. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]