Heat image forming device and method

A heat image forming device for selectively heating an adjacent surface, comprising

• an array of switching heating elements, with each heating element being a field effect transistor, the transistors each having a semiconductor layer, a gate electrode, a source electrode, a drain electrode and a dielectric layer deposited as thin-films onto a substrate, the gate electrode separated from the drain electrode and source electrode by the dielectric layer, the semiconductor layer having a current channel defined by a spatial gap between the source electrode and gate electrode, and an overlapping distance of the drain and source electrodes in the semiconductor layer;
• a plurality of conductive lines including gate address lines, current supply data lines, and current return lines, with each one of the gate electrodes electronically coupled to one of the gate lines, each one of the source electrodes electronically coupled to one of the data lines, and each one of the drain electrodes electronically coupled to one of the current return lines, each heating element having a current supplied via a connecting current supply data line in the current channel that is controlled by a voltage applied to the gate electrode via a connecting gate address line;
• wherein the current channel is closer to the surface being heated than the current return lines.