Patent ID: 8125504
Filing Date: 2012-02-28
Classification: H04N

Abstract:
1. An image forming apparatus for simultaneously conducting multiple lines of exposure by scanning multiple laser beams from multiple light sources onto an image carrier in a main scanning direction, comprising: multiple light sources which are driven to emit laser beams based on image data; and a control section capable of controlling an image formation in two types of image forming modes of a first image forming mode where an image is formed at a first image forming speed by using all the multiple light sources, and a second image forming mode where the image is formed without using at least one of the multiple light sources at a second image forming speed slower than the first image forming speed, wherein, the control section controls a light source which is not used in the second image forming mode to emit a laser beam onto outside of an image area where the image is formed based on the image data, and wherein the laser beam emission onto outside of the image area is an emission for latent image formation to stabilize cleaning of the image carrier.