Patent ID: 8555807

Claim:
A liquid droplet discharging apparatus comprising: a functional liquid droplet discharging head; a first workpiece stage and a second workpiece stage each configured to support a workpiece thereon; an inspection stage disposed between the first workpiece stage and the second workpiece stage, and configured to receive an inspection discharge of a liquid from the functional liquid droplet discharging head; an image formation area in which an image forming operation is executed by discharging the liquid from the functional liquid droplet discharging head onto the workpiece mounted on one of the first and second workpiece stages while causing relative movement between the functional liquid droplet discharging head and the one of the first and second workpiece stages in a movement direction; a first workpiece exchange area and a second workpiece exchange area that are arranged with the image formation area being disposed therebetween along the movement direction so that the workpieces are selectively supplied to and removed from the first workpiece stage and the second workpiece stage in the first workpiece exchange area and the second workpiece exchange area, respectively; an inspection area disposed between the image formation area and the first workpiece exchange area so that a discharge inspection of the functional liquid droplet discharging head is selectively executed in the inspection area by image recognition; an image recognizing section disposed in the inspection area, and configured to execute the image recognition with respect to a result of the inspection discharge to the inspection stage in the inspection area; a stage moving mechanism configured to selectively move the first workpiece stage between the image formation area and the first workpiece exchange area, to selectively move the second workpiece stage between the image formation area and the second workpiece exchange area, and to selectively move the inspection stage between the inspection area and the image formation area.