Optimized Optomechanical Anti-Aliasing Filter for Digital Camera Photography

We investigated an anti-aliasing (AA) filter for digital camera photography by which the excessively high-frequency components of the image signal are suppressed to avoid the aliasing effect. Our optomechanical AA filter was implemented by applying rapid relative motions to the imaging sensor. By the engineered motion blur of the mechanical dithers, the effective point-spread function (PSF) of the imaging system could be tailored to reject the unwanted high-frequency components of the image. For optimal operations, we developed a spiral filter motion protocol that could produce a Gaussian-like PSF. We experimentally demonstrated that our AA filter provides an improved filtering characteristic with a better compromise of the rejection performance and the signal loss. We also found that the pass band characteristic can be enhanced further by a color-differential acquisition mode. Our filter scheme provides a useful method of digital photography for low-error image measurements as well as for ordinary photographic applications where annoying $moir{\acute{e}}$ patterns must be suppressed efficiently.