Patent ID: 6170932
Filing Date: 2001-01-09
Classification: B41J,G06K

Abstract:
A printing system that drives a head to form a raster line, which comprises a row of dots aligned in a predetermined direction of a printing medium, and carries out a secondary scan, which shifts said printing medium relative to said head in a secondary scanning direction that is perpendicular to the predetermined direction every time when said raster line is formed, so as to print an image,wherein said head comprises a plurality of dot-forming elements, which respectively form dots on said printing medium and are arrayed in the secondary scanning direction,said printing system comprising:a selection unit configured to select at least part of the plurality of dot-forming elements at least once after a start of printing the image as effective dot-forming elements used for formation of dots, thereby changing the effective dot-forming elements;a feed amount setting unit configured to set an amount of feed in secondary scan after said selection, based on a positional relationship between effective dot-forming elements used for formation of dots before said selection and effective dot-forming elements used for formation of dots after said selection;a secondary scanning unit configured to carry out the secondary scan feeding the printing medium by the amount of feed; anda print head drive unit which drives only the effective dot-forming elements selected among the plurality of dot-forming elements to form dots.