MOVING OBJECT CIRCUMFERENCE MONITORING APPARATUS AND MOVING OBJECT

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To improve safety by easily confirming a part which becomes a dead angle for a driver such as the lateral/lower sides of a vehicle etc. by a picture giving little unnatural feeling. SOLUTION: An all-direction visual sensor 4 has: an optical system 4a for reflecting a light made incident from a visual field range of a maximum circumference of 360° in a predetermined direction; and a video imaging unit 4b for imaging the reflected light reflected by the system 4a to acquire image data. The sensor 4 is installed at the lower positions of side mirrors 2 and 3, e.g. of the vehicle 1 with its light axis 4d arranged to be in a horizontal direction. Thus, an overhead image of the lateral/lower sides of a vehicle from its front to back which gives little unnatural feeling to the driver is acquired, and a front/rear visual field image which gives little unnatural feeling to the driver is acquired with the side mirrors 2 and 3 as visual points. COPYRIGHT: (C)2005,JPO&NCIPI