Patent ID: 8482792

Claim:
An image processing apparatus for generating print data to be supplied to an image forming apparatus having a recording head with a plurality of printing elements, wherein the recording head scans the same location on a print medium repeatedly to form an image, the image processing apparatus comprising: a first half-tone processing unit that performs a first quantization process on input image data to calculate first N-level data, where N is an integer of at least 2, using a screen parameter corresponding to a screen condition of a target device, wherein the first N-level data represents half-tone dots to be reproduced; a conversion unit that converts the first N-level data to M-level data, where M is an integer greater than N; a configuring unit that configures printing density for each of the printing elements for each scan, by dividing the M-level data into the printing density for each scan, for respective pixels; and a second half-tone processing unit that performs a second quantization process on the printing density for the scan of interest to calculate second N-level data to be used by the image forming apparatus, based on a predetermined constraining information for the scan of interest, wherein the constraining information indicates how a dot is likely to be formed at respective pixels.