A CCD, or a Charge Coupled Device, is a microelectronic device used to capture digital images.

CCDs can work with several other digital video devices such as scanners, digital cameras, camcorders, astronomical telescopes, robots, radar images and satellite photograph among many others.

The origin of the CCD can be found in 1969 although it has not become widely popular until much later. This technology has allowed the improvement in the quality and resolution of images as well as the transferring and importing from one device into another. There can be a line stated between the time before the CCD technology appeared and after its invention.

CCDs are devices that contain elements that are sensitive to light. These photosensitive elements allow devices to read images and store them according to the light information it receives. Every CCD has an integrated circuit through which it stores and accumulates the image information and which will allow us to then transfer it to another device.

When a CCD is exposed to an image, it will store electrical charges which will accumulate the image information. In other ways, visual information on each light and color image aspect is translated into different electrical charges which will equal those light and color information pieces and this way represent it.

This way, CCDs allow us to transfer an image which we observe into a screen, a printer or a scanner through the electrical charges which it stores and which represent the image. CCDs have a very important amount of sensitivity, providing this way high quality final products and good resolution despite bad illumination.

The way in which a CCD stores information regarding color is through the electrical charge intensity. Each level of charge intensity corresponds to a different color from the spectrum. This system is used in order to store the image information equally as it is used to decode the electrical charges back into colors and therefore creating the image again. CCDs are present in many of the devices which surround us since many of the every day devices related to images which people use involve their use.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jakob Jelling is the founder of http://www.snapjunky.com. Visit his digital camera & camcorder guide and learn how to take better pictures and shoot better movies.