Basic TV Technology, 4th Edition

CCDs are the heart of the camera.

Charge-Coupled Devices

Charge-coupled devices (CCDs) are the parts inside of the camera that change the light focused on them by the camera lens into electrical signals. CCDs have been developed from the same sort of solid-state silicon chip technology that has made computers faster, smaller, more powerful, and cheaper; put powerful radios into small packages; and made home camcorders the size of a book.

CCD Layout and Operation

These chips are laid out with rows of photosensitive elements; these are our picture elements (pixels). The number of pixels on a CCD is defined by its matrix. For example, a matrix of 704 x 480 would indicate that there are 704 pixels placed across the screen horizontally in each of ...