Image forming apparatus and method

Abstract

The image forming apparatus comprises: a recording head which includes a plurality of nozzles through which droplets of liquid are ejected to and deposited on a recording medium to form dots on the recording medium, the nozzles being arranged in a nozzle row; a conveyance device which causes the recording head and the recording medium to move relatively to each other by conveying at least one of the recording head and the recording medium in a relative movement direction; a storage device which, of information indicating an amount of deposition position displacement from an ideal deposition position of the dots formed by the droplets ejected from the nozzles, stores information about the amount of deposition position displacement in at least a direction perpendicular to the relative movement direction of the conveyance device; a line figure recognition processing device which carries out processing for recognizing line figures from image data for printing; an ideal line identification device which determines an ideal line obtained by linking centers of the respective dots formed when printing a line figure, assuming that there is absolutely no deposition position displacement produced by any of the nozzles, in respect of the line figure recognized by the line figure recognition processing device; and an ejection timing control device which, when printing a line figure, controls ejection timing of a defective nozzle which produces deposition position displacement in a direction perpendicular to the relative movement direction, according to the information about the amount of deposition position displacement stored in the storage device and the ideal line determined by the ideal line identification device, in such a manner that a deposition center position of a dot formed by a droplet ejected from the defective nozzle moves closer to the ideal line, along the relative movement direction.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.