Screen Holdings Co., Ltd.

Dainippon Screen Mfg. Co., Ltd.

Ricoh Company, Ltd.

Kazuki Fukui

Kunio Muraji

Takaharu Yamamoto

Katsuyuki Hisaoka

Kazuya Takeda

Seiya Nomura

Mitsuhiro Yoshida

Tomotaka Kato

Kazuki Yamanaka

Satoru Kiyohara

Osamu Morizono

Satoshi Yasuda

Asuka Muramatsu

Hiroyuki Fuchioka

Takashi Kamigiku

Ippei Matsumoto

Makoto Shiomi

Hiroaki Kamon

Tuyoshi Okuda

A base material processing apparatus includes a first detector, a second detector, and an arithmetic unit. The first detector intermittently detects the position of the edge of the base material in the width direction at a first detection position to acquire a first detection result (Ra). The second detector intermittently detects the position of the edge of the base material in the width direction at a second detection position located downstream of the first detection position to acquire a second detection result (Rb). The arithmetic unit calculates a transport error of the base material by comparison between the first detection result (Ra) and the second detection result (Rb). The controller changes detection timing of at least one of the first detector and the second detector.

Base material processing apparatus and detection method

A printing apparatus for printing on a printing medium. The apparatus includes the following elements: a transport mechanism for transporting the printing medium in a transport direction; a first print head for printing an image on the printing medium, and printing a lead line used as a reference for determining a printing position in a width direction; a second print head for performing printing based on a position of the lead line; a printing position sensor for detecting the position of the lead line in the width direction; and a moving mechanism for moving the printing position sensor in the width direction of the printing medium according to a width dimension of the printing medium.

Printing apparatus

An image shifter creates plural pairs of shift image data. A shading corrector and a halftone dot processor create halftone shift image data from shift images. Further, a difference image creator creates halftone common image data which is a common part of a pair of halftone shift image data, and creates halftone positive difference image data and halftone negative difference image data each of which is a difference between the halftone common image data and one of a pair of halftone shift image data. A composite image creator synthesizes the halftone common image data corresponding to an amount of positional deviation, and the halftone positive difference image data or halftone negative difference image data. A controller executes printing on web paper. Since the image data is only synthesized, processing load can be lightened even if printing is performed to restrain positional deviations.

Printing apparatus that restrains positional deviation and a printing method using the same

The conversion of the dot percentages using the first conversion table Tdand the second conversion table Tdis performed for the gradation data Dh by the defective nozzle corrector. Here, the first conversion table Tdconverts the dot percentages of the pixels Px corresponding to the normal nozzles Nn having no discharge defect by the first rate Rdlower than 100%, and the second conversion table Tdconverts the dot percentages of the pixels Px corresponding to the surrounding nozzles Na located around the defective nozzle Nd by the second rate Rdhigher than the first rate Rd. Then, the shading correction is performed for the defect complemented gradation data Dc obtained by converting the dot percentages in this way by the shading corrector

Ink discharge complementing method and printing apparatus

A printing apparatus of this invention scans with a tester a testing chart printed by a printing controller to acquire testing image data. A total amount of displacement calculator calculates an amount of displacement of a recording position including a direction of misregister as a total amount of displacement, based on a large amount of displacement determined by a large amount of displacement determiner, a direction of displacement detected by a direction of displacement detector, a shift amount corresponding to an amount of displacement detecting chart determined by an amount of displacement detecting chart determiner, and a peak position of the amount of displacement detecting chart determined by the amount of displacement detecting chart determining unit. Thus, since a total amount of displacement of the misregister can be calculated only by printing the testing chart on web paper WP, an amount of displacement of the misregister in the transport direction can be obtained easily in a short time.

Printing apparatus, an amount of displacement calculating method, and a testing chart

A displacement amount calculation part in a base material processing apparatus calculates the degree of matching between an upstream data section and a downstream data section included in a first and a second detection results, which indicate time-varying changes in the positions of an edge of a base material in the width direction at an upstream and a downstream detection positions. This calculation uses calculation results obtained by sequentially calculating the degrees of matching between sub-data sections in the upstream data section and downstream sub-data sections in the downstream data section. This reduces the amount of computation and enables highly accurate detection of the amount of displacement of the base material in the transport direction on the basis of an identification result of the downstream data section that is highly matched with the upstream data section.

A printing apparatus for printing on an elongate printing medium includes the following elements: a transport mechanism for transporting the printing medium; a printing unit including a plurality of print heads arranged at intervals in a transport direction; a detecting unit including at least three detectors arranged as spaced from one another for detecting positions in a width direction of the printing medium; a variation history acquirer for deriving, for each detection cycle, a function approximate curve based on positions of the same location in the transport direction of the printing medium detected by the respective detectors, and acquiring from each function approximate curve, and as a variation history, a deviation amount in the width direction in each of the printing positions; a predicted position calculator for calculating, from the variation history, a predicted position in the width direction for each of the printing position; and a printing controller for printing while correcting the position based on the predicted position.

Printing apparatus and printing method

An image processing apparatus for a printing apparatus. The image processing apparatus includes a recording position acquiring device for acquiring recording positions of a reference image printed by a reference print head and a target image printed by a target print head, a positional deviation amount calculating device for calculating a deviation amount due to a skew with respect to the recording positions of the reference image and the target image, and a positional deviation interpolation image converting device, when there is a remainder of the deviation amount and the predetermined intervals, for adding a weight based on the remainder, and adding a smaller weight than the weight to the reference image or the target image without a remainder and adjoining the reference image or the target image with the remainder, thereby converting the image into a width direction positional deviation interpolation image.

Image processing apparatus and image processing method for a printing apparatus

Image data is accurately resized in real time by downscaling. An image signal generating apparatus includes a parameter generator that dynamically generates a parameter PM and an image signal generator that repeats processing of generating an output image signal Q in response to each sampling signal B. Each parameter includes a division ratio parameter DP. The division ratio parameter DP corresponds to a ratio of a second time period Tb and a third time period Tc other than the second time period Tb. The second time period Tb is a time interval until the generation of a sampling signal Bin a first time period Ta until input of an immediate timing signal Asince input of a last timing signal A. The image signal generator repeatedly generates a first weighted signal and a second weighted signal of the image signal in response to each sampling signal B.

Image signal generating apparatus, image inspection apparatus, printing system, and image signal generating method

An image processor of a printing apparatus including a first printing head having recording units spaced at a given interval orthogonal to a transportation direction of a print medium and spaced along the transportation direction of the print medium, a second printing head disposed downstream of the first printing head, a device for obtaining recording positions of first and second images printed with the first and second printing heads, a device for calculating a positional shift amount between the recording positions of the first and second images, and a positional shift interpolating image converter performing weighting, if a remainder is generated through division of the positional shift amount by the given interval, to the first or second image depending on the remainder to convert the first or second image into a positional shift interpolating image having been shifted in accordance with skew of the print medium.

Image processor of printing apparatus and image processing method thereof

Disclosed is a printing apparatus that performs printing onto a print medium including a transporting device that transports a print medium, a plurality of printing heads, a photographing unit that photographs the print medium, a shift detecting chart forming device, and a correcting device. The shift detecting chart forming device forms a shift detecting chart having a first line segment group consisting of first line segments that are printed onto the print medium at given intervals in an orthogonal direction with respect to the transportation direction with a reference printing head, and a second line segment group formed along the first line segment group, and consisting of second line segments that are printed with a subsequent printing head. The correcting device corrects a printing timing with the subsequent printing head relative to the reference printing head in accordance with a density variation of the photographed shift detecting chart.

A screening output density corrector of an image processor corrects output densities of a plurality of types of dotted pattern data stored in a screening data storage upon printing. A dotted image data generator uses a plurality of types of the dotted pattern data subjected to the output density correction for performing screening processing to each of images, the images being represented by the continuous tone image data. Consequently, the dotted image data generator generates dotted image data of the images with the corrected output density. Accordingly, output density correction is made not to the continuous tone image data but to the dotted pattern data. Consequently, uniformity of the discharge characteristic (the number of ink droplets) is obtainable upon printing with different types of dotted pattern data. This allows prevention of unevenness in printing through the screening processing based on a plurality of types of dotted pattern data.

Image processor and image processing method

In printing apparatus, an edge sensor detects a serpentine amount caused by transportation of a web. A predicted waveform data generating unit generates predicted waveform data on the serpentine amount to be produced in the following web in accordance with actually measured waveform data on the detected serpentine amount. A correcting unit corrects a printing position of an image in accordance with a shift amount, and applies a corrected printing position to a printing head. Here, the shift amount is determined with the shift amount determining unit in accordance with the predicted waveform data. Accordingly, the shift amount is determinable in accordance with the actually measured waveform data on the serpentine amount detected with the edge sensor more accurately than that through a method in which a shift amount is directly determined. This allows suppressed misregister.

Provided is a data processing method of a printing apparatus for printing a multi-color image on a printing medium by each of printing heads for at least two colors while transporting the printing medium relative to the printing heads in a paper-feed direction. The method includes a skew detecting step of detecting a degree of skew of the printing medium; a correction printing-data generating step of shifting print data from a printing unit for performing printing in a direction orthogonal to the paper-feed direction in accordance with the degree of skew to generate correction printing-data, the printing unit having a first printing head disposed upstream in the paper-feed direction and a second printing head spaced away from the first printing head downstream in the paper-feed direction; and a printing step of performing printing on the printing medium with the printing unit in accordance with the correction printing-data.

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Kyoto, Japan

Kazuki Fukui