Spatial filtering through elementary examples

The spatial filtering features of resistive grids have become important in microelectronics in the last two decades, in particular because of the current interest in the design of 'vision chips.' However, these features of the grids are unexpected for many who received a basic physics or electrical engineering education. The author's opinion is that the concept of spatial filtering is important in itself, and should be introduced and separately considered at an early educational stage. We thus discuss some simple examples, of both continuous and discrete systems in which spatial filtering may be observed, using only basic physics concepts.