Printing system for printing an image with lasers emitting diverging laser beams

A printing system for printing an image on a light sensitive medium, the printing system comprising:

• M sets of N lasers each, N and M each being a positive integer greater than one, for forming MN diverging laser light beams along a plurality of optical axes, all of said lasers in each of said sets being disposed in a common plane, wherein each of said lasers emanates a corresponding one of said diverging laser beams along a corresponding one of said optical axes;
• a stop plane having a stop aperture therein;
• M sets of N individual optical beam shaper and director assemblies, collectively situated between all of said lasers and the stop plane, wherein each one of said assemblies variably converts a corresponding one of the diverging laser light beams emanating from a different corresponding one of said lasers into a corresponding intermediate beam, having a substantially circular and converging cross-section, that is directed at a central portion of the stop aperture and substantially focused thereat so as to form MN intermediate beams which substantially pass through said aperture, each one of said assemblies being oriented along a corresponding one of the optical axes corresponding to one of said lasers, wherein adjacent ones of said intermediate beams associated with each set of lasers are spaced apart at a first pre-determined angular separation, .alpha., and wherein each of the optical beam shaper and director assemblies comprises:
• a radially symmetric collector lens having a sufficiently large numerical aperture to receive one of said diverging laser beams from said corresponding one of said lasers;
• a first lens group and a second lens group movably disposed along said corresponding one of the optical axes for converting the one of said diverging laser beams into a beam having a substantially circular cross-section, wherein the first lens group has optical power along a scan direction and the second lens group has optical power along a cross-scan direction;
• and
• a spherical lens for converting the substantially circular cross-section beam collectively produced by said first lens group and said second lens group into the corresponding intermediate beam which has a converging substantially circular cross-section;
• and
• an optical magnifying and directing assembly having a rear stop image plane and a magnification ratio, m, and situated between said stop plane and said medium for magnifying the intermediate beams passing through the aperture so as to form MN corresponding magnified beams and for directing the corresponding magnified beams to said medium as MN corresponding output beams such that adjacent ones of said output beams associated with each set of lasers are incident upon the rear stop image plane at a second angular separation substantially equal to .alpha./m.