Ink jet recording apparatus capable of printing in multiple different dot sizes
AssigneeMinolta Co., Ltd.
InventorJun Minakuti
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
An ink jet printing head that can eject ink droplets forming dot sizes in any of a plurality of differing dot sizes. The plurality of differing dot sizes has a low level range and a high level range. The ink jet printing head has a plurality of small size nozzles and a plurality of large size nozzles. The plurality of small size nozzles eject ink droplets capable of forming a plurality of differing dot sizes in a low level range. The plurality of large size nozzles eject ink droplets capable of forming a plurality of differing dot sizes in a high level range. The change in dot size between adjacent dot sizes of the low level range is different from the change in dot size between adjacent dot sizes of the high level range.
Claims32
An ink jet recording apparatus, comprising:
- a printing head;
- and
- a driver connected with said printing head, said driver being for applying signals to said printing head,
- wherein said printing head is capable of ejecting ink droplets onto the recording medium to form dots on a recording medium in any of a plurality of differing dot sizes in response to signals applied by said driver, each dot size in said plurality of differing dot sizes differing from other dot sizes in said plurality of differing dot sizes,
- wherein said plurality of differing dot sizes includes a low level range of dot sizes and a high level range of dot sizes, with dot sizes in said high level range being larger than dot sizes in said low level range, and
- wherein a change in dot size between adjacent dot sizes in said low level range is less than a change in dot size between adjacent dot sizes in said high level range.
An ink jet recording apparatus for printing out image data having a plurality of tone levels, said ink jet recording apparatus comprising:
- a printing head for ejecting ink droplets onto a recording medium, to form dots on the recording medium in any of a plurality of differing dot sizes, and
- a driver for driving said printing head,
- wherein said driver can drive said printing head, based on a tone level to be printed, to change the droplet size of an ink droplet to be effected so as to change the dot size of a resulting dot on said recording medium based on the tone level to be printed,
- wherein said plurality of differing dot sizes includes a low range of dot sizes corresponding to a range of low tone levels and a high range of dot sizes corresponding to a range of high tone levels, with dot sizes in said high range being larger than dot sizes in said low range, and
- wherein a change in dot size between adjacent dot sizes in said low range is less than a change in dot size between adjacent dot sizes in said high range.
A method of printing in an ink jet recording apparatus, said method comprising the steps of:
- inputting image data having a plurality of tone levels;
- driving a printing head, based on image data inputted in said step of inputting to eject ink droplets from said printing head, thereby forming ink dots on a recording medium, with each ink dot having a size corresponding to a respective one of said plurality of tone levels;
- and
- changing the dot size of an ink dot formed in said step of driving, depending upon the respective tone level to be printed so that changes in dot size between adjacent dot sizes corresponding to a low range of said tone levels are less than changes in dot size between adjacent dot sizes corresponding to a high range of said tone levels.
An ink jet recording apparatus comprising:
- a printing head for ejecting ink droplets onto said recording medium to thereby form dots on the recording medium;
- and
- a driver connected with said printing head to apply signals to said printing head,
- wherein said printing head is capable of ejecting ink droplets of varying size to form dots of varying size which correspond to respective density levels of signals applied to said printing head by said driver,
- wherein a change in dot size between dot sizes corresponding to adjacent density levels in a highlight density range is smaller than a change in dot size between dot sizes corresponding to adjacent density levels in a shadow density range.
An ink jet recording apparatus comprising:
- a first print head including a first nozzle from which ink droplets are operatively ejected, said first nozzle having a first diameter;
- a second print head including a second nozzle from which ink droplets are operatively ejected, said second nozzle having a second diameter that is greater than the first diameter;
- a driver, connected to said first print head and said second print head, capable of (i) controlling said first print head at a plurality of levels to eject ink droplets from said first nozzle onto a recording medium to form dots on the recording medium in any of n different dot sizes and (ii) controlling said second print head at a plurality of levels to eject ink droplets from said second nozzle onto a recording medium to form dots on the recording medium in any of m different dot sizes,
- wherein n and m are natural numbers, and m is less than n.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.