Citizen Watch Company, Ltd.

Chikara Aizawa

Sadao Masubuchi

Masafumi Yokoyama

Akira Shiota

Masaaki Matsunaga

Shigeru Futakami

Shinichi Nonaka

Maki Wakita

Sigeru Futakami

Kenji Mito

Toshiyuki Inage

Kazunari Takahashi

An optical printer capable of controlling the amount of exposure light, and so forth, accurately is disclosed, and the optical printer comprises a light source irradiating light and an optical shutter producing exposure light for exposing a photosensitive object by controlling transmission of the light from the light source.

Optical printer

A photosensitive element ( ) is provided on its photosensitive face side with a non-photosensitive portion with a width D extending from a front end to a rear end side in a conveying direction and a non-photosensitive portion with a width D extending from the rear end to the front end side. A position of light irradiation of an optical head onto the photosensitive element is set within a range extending a first point at a distance of D from the center of the conveying roller ( ) on the upstream side in the conveying direction to a second point at a distance of D from the center of the conveying roller ( ) on the downstream side in the conveying direction.

A line-scanning optical printer, which forms an image on a sensitized sheet ( ) by projecting a linear light having a given width and length thereto while successively scanning individual lines in the direction of the width, comprises a casing ( ) having light shielding properties and including a window portion for radiating the linear light to the outside, a light emitting element ( ), which substantially functions as a point light source and is stored in the casing, an optical system ( ) for guiding light from the light emitting element ( ) as the linear light to the window portion, and a liquid crystal optical shutter ( ) attached to the window portion.

Line-scanning optical printer

The present invention uses LEDs as the light source in a optical printer employing a line scanning method in which an image is produced by relative motion of the light to a photosensitive medium. LEDs are arranged on a mounting substrate with LED pairs, each pair being of the same color, disposed symmetrically as to the center point of the line. Similarly, the power supply lead wires for the LEDs are also disposed symmetrically. In mounting the components on the mounting substrate, a light-intercepting material is used for intercepting light from the side faces of the LEDs.

Optical printer apparatus

The present invention employs LEDs and a liquid crystal shutter driven in synchronization with the position of the photosensitive paper, thereby eliminating image distortion even where the head of the optical printer apparatus is subjected to unanticipated load during scanning by the head. A rotary encoder (,) is provided on the rotating shaft of the motor (,) that drives the optical head (,), and the drive timing for the LEDs (,) and the liquid crystal shutter (,) is synchronized with the output of the rotary encoder.

Growing community of inventors

Tsukui-gun, Japan

Chikara Aizawa