Digital image forming apparatus which specifies a sensitivity characteristic of a photoconductor

An image forming apparatus for forming an image under a set image forming condition, said image forming apparatus comprising:

• image forming means for forming an image, said image forming means including:
• a mobile photoconductor,
• charging means for charging said photoconductor,
• exposing means for exposing said photoconductor, charged by said charging means, to light modulated by light emission data to form an electrostatic latent image on said photoconductor, and
• developing means for developing, with a developer material, the electrostatic latent image on said photoconductor formed by said exposing means;
• potential detecting means for detecting a potential of said photoconductor at a predetermined detection position;
• first specifying means for specifying a sensitivity characteristic of said photoconductor at said detection position based on the potential of said photoconductor detected by said potential detecting means;
• second specifying means for specifying the sensitivity characteristic of said photoconductor at a development position of said developing means based on the sensitivity characteristic of said photoconductor specified by said first specifying means;
• and
• setting means for determining and setting an image forming condition based on the sensitivity characteristic specified by said second specifying means.

An image forming apparatus for forming an image under a set image forming condition, said image forming apparatus comprising:

• image forming means for forming an image, said image forming means including:
• a photoconductor,
• charging means for charging said photoconductor,
• exposing means for exposing said photoconductor, charged by said charging means, to light modulated by light emission data to form an electrostatic latent image on said photoconductor, and
• developing means for developing, with a developer material, the electrostatic latent image on said photoconductor formed by said exposing means;
• developer material detecting means for detecting the amount of developer material adhering to the image on said photoconductor developed by said developing means;
• specifying means for specifying a sensitivity characteristic of said photoconductor;
• deciding means for controlling said image forming means to form a test image, for controlling said developer material detecting means to detect the amount of developer material adhering to the test image, and for calculating a surface potential of the test image based on the sensitivity characteristic specified by said specifying means to decide the surface potential of said photoconductor at which development by said developing means is started based on the detected adhering amount and the calculated surface potential;
• and
• setting means for setting an image forming condition based on the surface potential decided by said deciding means.

An image forming apparatus for converting image data into light emission data, indicating the quantity of light emission based on .gamma. correction data, to form an image based on the light emission data, said image forming apparatus comprising:

• image forming means for forming an image, said image forming means including:
• a photoconductor,
• charging means for charging said photoconductor,
• exposing means for exposing said photoconductor, charged by said charging means, to light modulated by the light emission data to form an electrostatic latent image on said photoconductor,
• developing means for developing, with a developer material, the electrostatic latent image on said photoconductor formed by said exposing means, and
• transferring means for transferring the image developed by said developing means onto a transfer material;
• developer material detecting means for detecting the amount of developer material adhering to the image on said photoconductor developed by said developing means;
• first specifying means for specifying a sensitivity characteristic of said photoconductor;
• second specifying means for specifying a development characteristic of said developing means based on the sensitivity characteristic specified by said first specifying means and the adhering amount of developer material detected by said developer material detecting means;
• third specifying means for specifying a transfer characteristic of said transferring means;
• deciding means for deciding an optimal operating condition of said image forming means based on the development characteristic of said developing means specified by said second specifying means and the transfer characteristic specified by said third specifying means;
• and
• calculating means for calculating .gamma. correction data for obtaining a desired gradation characteristic under the operating condition decided by said deciding means.