PURPOSE: To enable the arbitrary adjustment of the sensitivity of a solid-state image pickup element by colors of illuminating light by impressing the OFD pulses which have a voltage of a prescribed level or above and are controlled in pulse width by colors to OFD electrodes and controlling the effective charge accumulation time in the solid-state image pickup element by colors.

CONSTITUTION: The image reflected from an object to be photographed is formed on the photodetecting surface of the solid-state image pickup element (CCD) 20 via an objective lens 18. The CCD 20 has an OFD voltage-sensitivity characteristic and is driven by a CCD driving circuit 22 which outputs a CCD driving signal, by which the reflected image is photoelectrically changed and the image signals of respective colors R, G, B are successively outputted to a video signal processing circuit 24. The sensitivity of the CCD 20 is controlled by the OFD pulses impressed to the OFD electrodes. A timing pulse generator 28 applies a timing pulse to the CCD driving circuit 22 in synchronization with the synchronizing signal applied from a synchronizing signal generator 30 and applies the synchronizing signal to the CCD sensitivity control circuit 26.