Combined electronic/silver-halide image capture system with cellular transmission capability

TLDR: In this paper, a combined electronic/silver-halide image capture system is presented, which is capable of transmitting electronic image data using conventional cellular telephone transmission technology, including a camera unit and a cellular telephone.

Abstract: A combined electronic/silver-halide image capture system is capable of transmitting electronic image data using conventional cellular telephone transmission technology. The system includes a camera unit and a cellular telephone that can be electrically coupled to the camera unit. The camera unit has both a photographic film plane and an electronic image sensor. A mechanism is provided for directing scene light from a scene to be imaged to at least one of the photographic film plane and the electronic image sensor, wherein the electronic image sensor generates analog image signals in response to incident scene light. A processing unit receives the analog image signals generated by the electronic image sensor and generates digital image signals represented of the scene to be imaged. A memory unit is provided to selectively store the digital image signals generated by the processing unit. The camera unit also preferably includes a display so that the digital image signals generated by the processing means can be viewed by the operator of the system. The digital image signals are supplied to a cellular telephone which transmits the digital image signals to a remote location when the camera unit is electrically coupled to the cellular telephone.