Canon Kabushiki Kaisha

Hitoshi Sugimoto

Hiromitsu Hirabayashi

Miyuki Matsubara

Noribumi Koitabashi

Shigeyasu Nagoshi

Fumihiro Gotoh

Hiroshi Tajika

Yuji Akiyama

Kiichiro Takahashi

Naoji Otsuka

Atsushi Arai

Kentaro Yano

Jiro Moriyama

Toshiharu Inui

Masaya Uetsuki

Masaya Uetuki

Osamu Iwasaki

Tsutomu Abe

Masami Ikeda

Takeshi Yazawa

Yoshiaki Takayanagi

Hitoshi Nishikori

Masahiko Higuma

Souhei Tanaka

Naohito Asai

Yasuhiro Numata

Toshio Kashino

Masao Kato

Shinichi Sato

Eiichiro Shimizu

Minako Kato

Sadayuki Sugama

Haruo Uchida

Miyuki Fujita

Kazuyoshi Takahashi

Hidehiko Kanda

Takahiro Mori

Yutaka Kurabayashi

Minoru Teshigawara

Toshiyuki Chikuma

Mitsuru Kurata

Yasuhiro Yamada

Tokihide Ebata

Masayuki Hirose

Kenjiro Watanabe

Makoto Takemura

Koji Terasawa

Hirofumi Hirano

Hideo Fukazawa

Shinichi Tochihara

Akio Suzuki

Hiroyuki Inoue

Seiichiro Karita

Kazuaki Masuda

Takashi Nojima

Hiroki Tajima

Takeshi Iwasaki

Takeshi Okazaki

Noriko Sato

Kazuo Iwata

Masahito Yoshida

Takayuki Murata

Yasufumi Tanaami

Yasuyuki Hirai

Yoshinori Nakagawa

Atsuhiko Masuyama

Makoto Torigoe

Nobuyuki Kuwabara

Tetsuji Kurata

Hiroshi Yoshino

Naomi Oshio

Makoto Kawarama

Makoto Aoki

Masanori Takenouchi

Shoji Koike

Masahiro Haruta

Daigoro Kanematsu

Satoshi Seki

Fumihiro Goto

Hiroshi Sato

Koichiro Kawaguchi

Noboru Koumura

Takashi Saito

Genji Inada

Shinji Kanemitsu

Tetsuhiro Nitta

Yoshihisa Takizawa

Masafumi Wataya

Makoto Kashimura

Hisao Yaegashi

Hideto Yokoi

Isao Ebisawa

Mayumi Yamamoto

Shigeru Yoshimura

Shinya Matsui

Shin Ishimatsu

Masaru Sato

Shigeki Fukui

Yasuhiro Unosawa

Kenji Aono

The present invention provides a liquid application device, an inkjet recording apparatus and a recording apparatus, which are capable of performing an adequate application initial operation according to the length of waiting time and power-off time, as well as a method of controlling the liquid application device. In the present invention, information on an end time of the previous processing for collecting liquid is read from a nonvolatile memory, current time information indicating the current time is obtained, and information on a lapse of time from the end time of the previous collection to a start time of the current application. Thereafter, the number of preliminary rotations R of an application roller is decided based on the information on the lapse of time with reference to a look-up table. Sequentially, the application roller is rotated by the decided number of preliminary rotations R to perform preprocessing operation.

Liquid application device, inkjet recording apparatus, and method of controlling liquid application device

In a printer, when difference in ejection characteristic among nozzles appears as density non-uniformity and the way of letting the density non-uniformity appear is different depending upon kind of image, proper density correction is performed. Specifically, the kind of image to be printed is judged, and when the kind of image is a halftone image according to the judgment, a density correction table corresponding to the halftone image is selected and used to perform the density correction. Also when the kind of image is judged to be a solid image (without a portion of the halftone image), a proper table is selected similarly and used to perform the density correction.

Image processing apparatus and image processing method

Replacement of a recording head on a recording apparatus is detected on the basis of a serial number allocated to each recording head. The recording head also carries head characteristic information such as color information, shading information and so forth. When the recording head is replaced with a new one, the head characteristic information of the newly mounted recording head is automatically stored, so that head driving conditions are automatically determined to optimize the recording conditions without requiring any manual adjustment. Recovery operation is automatically executed when replacement of the recording head is detected, so that required recording conditions are recovered without manual instructions.

Ink jet recording apparatus and method using replaceable recording heads

For eliminating waste of ink and achieving high charging efficiency with a reduced charging time where a printing head is equipped with a second tank for reserving a predetermined amount of ink and a supply system is configured to supply ink from a first tank to the second tank intermittently, the second tank is provided with a variable internal volume. The internal volume is varied to cause the second tank itself to function as an actuator for charging ink and performing a venting process. Specifically, the internal volume is forcibly reduced to cause a reverse flow of a gas residing in the second tank along with ink into the first tank, which makes it possible to generate of waste ink that is released to the outside. A normal charging operation can be completed simply by causing a change in the opposite direction (the direction of increasing the internal volume). Relatedly, the second tank may be provided with a member for holding ink and generating a negative pressure originating from an elastic force. With connection of the first tank and the member, the pressure in the second tank is reduced to cause the member to expand, thereby introducing ink into the same. This introduction is stopped by regulating the expansion with a displaceable unit which expands when the pressure is reduced. The regulation is performed at such a position that the negative pressure generated in the member by canceling regulation is in equilibrium with an ink meniscus-holding ability of the printing head.

Ink container, inkjet printing apparatus and ink supplying method

A printing apparatus can reduce degradation in print quality of a printed image, notably in a highlight portion or an intermediate gradation portion, in the case where the image is printed by forming dots of a plurality of sizes. Specifically, data causing larger and smaller cyan ink droplets, respectively, to be ejected is independently subjected to a conversion to n-value process. Thus, the data for larger ink droplets is present in a portion of printing data which corresponds to the highlight portion or intermediate gradation portion of the image. During printing, larger dots are formed in this area, thereby making it difficult to perceive possible stripes caused by the offset of the positions at which smaller droplets impact a sheet.

Printing data producing method for printing apparatus

An ink jet printing method uses an ink jet ejecting portion for ejecting ink on a printing material and a print quality improving liquid ejecting portion for ejecting print quality improving liquid on the printing material. The application mode of the print quality improving liquid is different depending on the printing mode in which a printing operation is carried out.

Ink jet printing method and apparatus

An apparatus and method capable of obtaining an output characteristic of the print unit and determining a correction value for an output density, without using an expensive scanner. To realize this, a nozzle array consisting of a plurality of nozzles provided in the print head is divided into a plurality of nozzle blocks &lsqb;a&rsqb; to &lsqb;d&rsqb; and each of patches is formed by using the nozzles of the same nozzle block allocated to the patch. The patches are printed in a size and shape that allows the densities of the patches to be optically detected by the density sensor. A test pattern comprising these patches is measured by the density sensor to make a density correction for each nozzle of the print head.

Test pattern printing method, information processing apparatus, printing apparatus and density variation correction method

Ink-jet recording apparatus and ink-jet recording method using inks of different densities, and recorded articles

Ink jet printing apparatus and ink jet printing method

In a supply system which includes an ink container for reserving a predetermined amount of ink to be supplied to a printing head and which is configured such that ink is intermittently supplied to the container from an ink tank, there is provided a structure that fundamentally eliminates waste of ink associated with an operation of charging the container to apply a required negative pressure to the head. An ink containing body in which a negative pressure can be generated because of its elasticity is provided in the container. After the ink containing body is expanded to introduce ink into the same by depressurizing the interior of the container, the interior of the container is pressurized to contract the ink containing body, thereby returning a predetermined amount of ink to the tank. A negative pressure is thus generated in equilibrium with an ink meniscus holding ability of the head.

Ink container, inkjet printing apparatus, and ink supplying method

An ink-jet printing apparatus and an ink-jet printing method allow the printing of an image with high quality without causing a change in ink color formed on the printing medium while keeping the printing conditions constant regardless of changing of the number of nozzles to be printed and the amount of transferring of the printing medium. This printing is performed, for example, by restricting use of the number of nozzles, which belong to a nozzle row located on an upstream side in the sub-scan direction, before changing the amount of transferring of the printing medium; and restricting use of the number of nozzles, which belong to the nozzle rows located on a downstream side in the sub-scan direction, after changing the amount of transferring of the printing medium.

Ink-jet printing apparatus and ink-jet printing method

An ink jet printing apparatus including: a print unit having a polarity of ejection outlet arrays, for ejecting ink,; a scan unit for scanningly moving the print unit relative to the print medium in a main scan direction; and a feed unit for feeding the print medium relative to the print unit in a direction which is different from the main scan direction, wherein an image is formed on the print medium while repeating a scanning operation of the scanning unit and a feeding operation by the feeding unit. The apparatus also includes an information obtaining unit for obtaining image information; and a selecting unit for selecting at least one of the ejection outlet arrays to effect printing for the image data in a predetermined area, on the basis of the information obtained by the information obtain unit about image formations.

Ink jet printing apparatus and method with suppressed bleeding of inks

An ink-jet recording apparatus having first eject ports ejecting a first ink; second eject ports ejecting a second ink; a recovery means for executing recovery treatments respectively against the first and second eject ports; and a controlling means for controlling the recovery means to execute sucking treatments against corresponding eject ports whenever elapsed times in respective first and second eject ports after the most recent recovery treatments against respective first and second eject ports by the recovery means exceed respective predetermined threshold times, where the predetermined threshold time for the second eject ports is set at an integral which is more than two times the predetermined threshold time for the first eject ports.

Ink-jet recording apparatus

Growing community of inventors

Yokohama, Japan

Hitoshi Sugimoto