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US 6,211,894 B1Granted
Image forming method
AssigneeKonica Corporation
InventorsYorihiro Yamaya, Shigeru Mano, Kaori Fukumuro, Hiroshi Watanabe
Life of this patent
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Abstract
In an image forming method in that an image-receiving layer of an image-receiving element is in contact with an ink sheet comprising a thermally transferable dye, and the dye is transferred to the image-receiving layer in accordance with imagewise-heating by a thermal head, the image-receiving layer having dye image formed by dye transfer is subjected to re-heating through a thin film material by thermal head.
Claims7
An image forming process comprising
- superposing an ink sheet on an image-receiving element, said ink sheet including an ink layer which contains a thermal transfer dye, said image-receiving element comprising an image-receiving layer adapted to accept said thermal transfer dye, whereby said ink layer is brought into contact with said image-receiving layer;
- imagewise treating the superposed ink sheet and the image-receiving element by a thermal head for a first time period per scanning line of said thermal head, whereby said dye of said ink sheet is transferred to the image-receiving layer to form a transferred image;
- bringing a thin film material into contact with an image-forming surface of said ink sheet carrying said transferred image;
- reheating said transferred image by a thermal head for a second time period per scanning line of said thermal head, said second time period being shorter than said first time period;
- and
- supplying a second amount of energy to said thermal head during said reheating which is less than a first amount of energy which provides maximum density during said imagewise heating.
3 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.