Image forming apparatus using heating sublimation technique

An image forming apparatus comprising:

• a print head controllably driven according to print data;
• a heater device for applying thermal energy to a recording medium in order to fix ink applied on its surface layer by the print head onto its fixing layer;
• and
• a controller for producing the print data from image data;
• wherein the controller includes a fixing color development characteristics compensating section for effecting fixing color development characteristics compensation during the production of the print data from the image data, based on fixing color development characteristics of the ink to the fixing layer dependent on the thermal energy.

An image forming apparatus comprising:

• a print head controllably driven according to print data;
• a heater device for applying thermal energy to a recording medium in order to fix ink applied on its surface layer by the print head onto its fixing layer;
• and
• a controller for producing the print data from image data;
• wherein the controller includes a heat absorption rate compensating section for compensating for a difference in a color-dependent heat absorption rate for a radiant heat beam during the production of the print data from the image data.

An image forming apparatus comprising:

• a print head controllably driven according to print data;
• a heater device for applying thermal energy to a recording medium in order to fix ink applied on its surface layer by the print head onto its fixing layer;
• and
• a controller for producing the print data from image data;
• wherein said controller includes a deformation compensating section, a fixing color development characteristics compensating section and a heat absorption rate compensating section;
• said deformation compensating section compensates for displacement between a target image and a fixed image due to size change in the vertical and/or lateral direction of the recording medium occurring in association with application of the thermal energy thereto;
• said fixing color development characteristics compensating section effects fixing color development characteristics compensation during the production of the print data from the image data, based on fixing color development characteristics of the ink to the fixing layer dependent on the thermal energy;
• and
• said heat absorption rate compensating section compensates for a difference in a color-dependent heat absorption rate for a radiant heat beam during the production of the print data from the image data.