Ricoh Company, Ltd.

Yoshiaki Kawai

Masashi Suzuki

Shingo Nishizaki

Tomohide Kondoh

Makoto Higashiyama

Shinji Kobayashi

Tadashi Shinohara

Kazuyuki Sato

Takao Watanabe

Yuichiro Shukuya

Nobuyoshi Kaima

Shinya Tanaka

Takashi Enami

Akira Murakata

Ryohta Morimoto

Miyo Taniguchi

Kentaroh Kurosu

Manabu Kodama

A vehicle control system determines a travel priority of a vehicle based on a travel condition of the vehicle. In response to detection of an oncoming vehicle ahead of the vehicle along a single guide path, the system compares between the travel priority of the vehicle, and a travel priority of the oncoming vehicle, and selects one of the vehicle and the oncoming vehicle as a vehicle to change a traveling route, to allow the unselected vehicle to continue traveling along the single guide path.

Driverless vehicle, and apparatus, system, and method of vehicle control

An image forming apparatus includes a skew correcting unit that performs skew correction by dividing an input image that has undergone a halftone process into image data in a predetermined skew correction area in a main scanning direction and by shifting the image data in the skew correction area in a sub-scanning direction; an edge detecting unit that detects whether a pixel at a division position is an edge pixel based on concentrations of a set of pixels including the pixel at the division position; a correction area determining unit that, if detected that the pixel at the division position is the edge pixel, determines a correction area that is an area of pixels including the edge pixel to be subjected to concentration correction within the skew correction area; and an edge correcting unit that corrects concentrations of the pixels within the correction area.

Image forming apparatus, image forming method, and computer program product that performs skew correction

An image forming apparatus capable of minimizing degradation in density correction as a part of skew correction includes a noise-occurrence determining unit, a correction-target-pixel selecting unit, a density correcting unit, and a phase correcting unit. When the noise-occurrence determining unit determines that noise would appear, the density correcting unit performs density correction on a correction target pixel that is determined by the correction-target-pixel selecting unit. The phase correcting unit corrects an output point in time of image data of the density-corrected correction target pixel in a pixel period during which the image data can be output so as to output the image data at a position displaced away from a shift position or toward a shift position.

Method and apparatus for image forming and computer program product

A pattern generating unit generates correction patterns on a transfer belt. Detection sensors detect the correction patterns, and amounts of magnification correction, amounts of misregistration in the main- and the sub-scanning direction are calculated. The amount of skew between each of colors is then calculated, and a position where an image is divided and a direction for shifting a divided image are determined. Possible dividing-positions are also determined, and a calculated dividing position and each of the possible dividing positions are compared with one another. Then, a possible dividing position closest to the calculated dividing position is set as an actual dividing position.

Image correcting device, image forming apparatus, and image correcting method

A maintenance pattern forming method includes conveying, generating, and forming. The conveying conveys a transfer member on a surface of a conveying member such that there is a spacing area between two adjacent transfer members on the surface of the conveying member. The generating generates a timing signal for at least one of a plurality of colors formed by a color image forming apparatus. The forming forms at least one of a process control pattern, a position adjustment pattern, and a blade curl suppression pattern onto the spacing area based on the timing signal.

Method and apparatus for color image forming capable of effectively forming a quality color image

An image forming apparatus using a synchronization signal generator can easily generate a pixel clock that enables both a magnification correction in a main scanning direction and a correction of expansion and contraction of pixel width in the main scanning direction. Each of pixel clock generation units generates a clock signal by dividing a frequency of a high-frequency clock so as to generate pulses of a reference period, a long period longer than the reference period and a short period shorter than the reference period, and outputs, as the pixel clock, one of the pulses that is designated by an output selection signal. A pixel clock correction data synthesizing unit synthesizes a first selection signal, which is generated base on a time-series distribution of the pulses of each period defined by a first set of data, and a second selection signal, which is based on a time-series distribution of the pulses of each period defined by a second set of data, so as to generate the output selection signal.

Synchronization signal generator and image forming apparatus

In an image forming device, a correction unit corrects image formation operation based on a plurality of correction patterns. A pattern creation unit forms an electrostatic latent image of the correction patterns on a photoconductor and transferring the image to an intermediate transfer body to form the correction patterns thereon. A pattern detecting unit detects the correction patterns formed on the intermediate transfer body. A speed detecting unit detects a movement speed of the correction patterns on the intermediate transfer body are moved. A timing holding unit computes a set value of detection start timing for starting detection of each correction pattern to hold the set value. The correction unit is provided to determine, in advance of correcting image formation operation, a detection start timing based on the movement speed and the set value.

Image forming device, image formation operation correcting method, and image formation operation correcting program

Upon predetermined mark image measurement, the timing signal is adjusted to obtain a required correction amount for a scan magnification of the modulated light in a measurement range of the predetermined mark image measurement, while, upon regular image forming operation, the timing signal is adjusted to obtain the required correction amount for the scan magnification of the modulated light in the entire scanning range of the modulated light for regular image forming operation.

Image forming apparatus, image forming method, program and computer readable information recording medium

An image reading apparatus which is capable of detecting a foreign particle interfering with an image reading operation includes a reference image plate, an image reading device, a peak value detector, a first memory, a comparator, and an error output controller. The reference image plate has a reference white image on the surface of the plate, and the first memory stores a first reference value. The image reading device reads such a reference white image for one line in a main scanning direction. The peak value detector detects a smallest data among the data which are included in the reference white image read by the image reading device. Then, the comparator compares the smallest data detected by the peak value detector with the first reference value. Finally, the error output controller outputs a white image error when the smallest data is smaller than the first reference value.

Method and apparatus for image reading capable of detecting dust that disturbs image reading operation

An image reading apparatus includes an image sensor and an offset adjusting circuit for generating an offset-counterbalancing signal in different levels. The level is selected in accordance with an offset in an image signal. The offset is adjusted by adding an offset-counterbalancing signal to the image signal to output an offset-adjusted image signal. Sample clock signals are generated in different phases. A signal sampling circuit samples the offset-adjusted image signal to output a sampled image signal. A peak value detector detects peak black and peak white values in the sampled image signal upon reading reference black and reference white images. A memory stores the peak black and peak white values in association with the respective corresponding sample clock phases, controller instructs the offset adjusting circuit generate an appropriate level offset-counterbalancing signal, commands the reading of the reference black image to detect a peak black value to determine an offset-counterbalancing value such that a value made by subtracting the offset-counterbalancing value from the peak black value falls within a predetermined appropriate range for the peak black value. A second controller selects a phase at which the peak black and white values fall in the respective predetermined appropriate ranges.

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Kanagawa, Japan

Yoshiaki Kawai