Abstract: An image file recording apparatus of the present invention records, into a recording medium, an image file that includes image data and header information which has variable-length information, and includes: a JPEG compression unit which generates image data; a microcomputer which determines a first address indicating the head of the image file and a second address obtained by adding a fixed value to the first address; and an APP portion writing unit 205 which writes, without going through a memory, the image data into an area, in the recording medium, starting from the second address.

Abstract: A contour emphasizing circuit according to the present invention comprises a line memory circuit 11 for retaining image data of each scanning line, an image data retaining circuit 12 comprised of a combination of delay elements for delaying the image data per pixel, a contour emphasizing signal generating circuit 13 for executing a coefficient operation with respect to a central pixel and peripheral pixels and generating a contour emphasizing signal S2, an image boundary detecting circuit 14 for detecting an image boundary portion separating effective and ineffective of the image data, and an input/output switching circuit 15 for switching between an input to the image data retaining circuit 12 from the line memory circuit 11 and an output of the image data retaining circuit with respect to the contour emphasizing signal generating circuit 13 based on a result of the detection of the image boundary detecting circuit 14.

Abstract: A solid-state image sensor includes photoelectric converters positioned either in a complementary color filter array or in the Bayer color filter array. The solid-state image sensor either adds together electric charges obtained by 9 photoelectric converters that relate to one color in each portion of six rows and six columns of the photoelectric converters so as to output a resulting electric charge as one pixel, or outputs the electric charges obtained by 9 photoelectric converters that relate to one color as 9 pixels without added together. By adding together the electric charges, the resolution of an image becomes one ninth of the case where the electric charges are not added together, and the sensitivity becomes 9 times higher than the same. The control unit not shown in the drawing determines a time length for photoelectric conversion assuming that the electric charges are not added together.