Printing apparatus

A printing apparatus provided with a printing section to print text or an image on a printing target medium from a film-shaped medium, comprising:

• a supply spool that feeds out a film-shaped medium to the printing section in printing processing;
• a wind-up spool that winds up the film-shaped medium from the printing section in the printing processing;
• a DC motor that rotates at least one of the supply spool and the wind-up spool;
• a motor driver that supplies a drive current to the DC motor;
• a rotation amount detector that detects a rotation amount of the DC motor;
• and
• a controller that controls the motor driver,
• wherein the controller calculates a drive current to be supplied to the DC motor for providing the DC motor with a same rotation velocity as a rotation velocity of a reference DC motor based on a difference between a rotational speed of the DC motor in driving the DC motor at a predetermined supply current without a tension due to the film-shaped medium being applied and a rotational speed of the reference DC motor in driving the reference DC motor at the predetermined supply current, and controls the motor driver to supply the calculated drive current.