# Signal-to-noise properties of correlation plenoptic imaging with chaotic light

## TL;DR

This paper analyzes the noise characteristics of correlation plenoptic imaging using chaotic light, demonstrating that one scheme offers higher SNR and efficiency in image acquisition compared to another.

## Contribution

It introduces and compares two CPI schemes with chaotic light, highlighting the advantages of the standard imaging scheme in noise control and frame reduction.

## Key findings

- The second CPI scheme achieves higher SNR.
- The second scheme reduces the number of frames needed for a given SNR.
- The noise properties are characterized and compared for both schemes.

## Abstract

Correlation Plenoptic Imaging (CPI) is a novel imaging technique, that exploits the correlations between the intensity fluctuations of light to perform the typical tasks of plenoptic imaging (namely, refocusing out-of-focus parts of the scene, extending the depth of field, and performing 3D reconstruction), without entailing a loss of spatial resolution. Here, we consider two different CPI schemes based on chaotic light, both employing ghost imaging: the first one to image the object, the second one to image the focusing element. We characterize their noise properties in terms of the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and compare their performances. We find that the SNR can be significantly higher and easier to control in the second CPI scheme, involving standard imaging of the object; under adequate conditions, this scheme enables reducing by one order of magnitude the number of frames for achieving the same SNR.