Time-of-flight cameras with multiple distributed illumination units

In this paper, the simultaneous operation of multiple distributed illumination units for time-of-flight (TOF) cameras is addressed. On the one hand, multiple illumination units can be used independently of each other by several means (spatial, temporal, wavelength and modulation division). On the other hand, constructive interference of a number of illumination units can be used to increase the modulation contrast, to decrease the necessary integration time and to increase the phase data reliability.