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A series of high performance gimbal payloads were developed. Both pan and tilt motion axes are driven by compact, ultrasonic, direct drive piezoelectric motors. The motors provide fast response, high motion stiffness and natural frequency, high precision, high mechanical power density, high torque and consume low power. These features allow improved SWaP parameters and performing active Optical Image Stabilization. The direct drive and high torque enable high angular acceleration, facilitating real-time panoramic imaging by fast move and settle of field of views and creating a mosaic of images. Mosaic is achieved with high optical stabilization level in the presence of vibrations. All the payloads achieve angular acceleration of 70-100 Rad/sec² and high angular velocity, which are enablers for the mosaic generation.
In this paper we report on the structure, operation and imaging performance of three gimbal payloads. Options for attaining motion-supported super-resolution are discussed and demonstrated by fast, sub-pixel, angular scanning of the gimbal.
The combination of mosaic generation and super resolution allows realizing an equivalent of optical zoom or of a large FOV staring vision with outstanding resolution. The refresh rate of the mosaic or the super resolution image is reduced, where mosaic with stabilization is built at a rate of 10 fps and super resolution at an acquisition rate of > 30 fps.
The smallest payload has a diameter of 29 mm, carries either a 5MP day camera or a small 120x160 pixels IR camera, weighs 26 gram and attains a 1mRad angular stabilization.
The second payload has a diameter of 58 mm, carries two cameras (12MP day and 480x640 pixels thermal), weighs 190 gram, has angular resolution of 22 µRad and attains angular stability of 70 µRad.
The biggest payload has a diameter of 114 mm, carries two cameras (12 MP day zoom and 480x640 thermal with optional zoom), weighs 1.2 kg, has angular resolution of 9 µRad attains a stabilization of 50 µRad.
Performance of the 3 payloads will be demonstrated in Stabilization, Mosaic and Super Resolution modes.
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