Methods and apparati for spectral imaging using interferometers of the Fabry-Perot type

摘要

A method and an apparatus of analyzing an optical image of a scene to determine the spectral intensity of each pixel thereof, comprising: collecting incident light from the scene; passing the light through an interferometer which outputs modulated light corresponding to a predetermined set of linear combinations of the spectral intensity of the light emitted from each pixel; focusing the light outputted from the interferometer on a two dimensional detector array; and processing the output of the detector array to determine the spectral intensity of each pixel thereof; the interferometer being of the low-finesse translating Fabry-Perot type in which the optical path difference is varied to modulate the light by translating an element of the interferometer, such that at each instant each detector sees a different point of the scene.