Patent ID: 8457362

Claim:
An image inspecting apparatus configured to inspect an image formed on a sheet ejected from an image forming unit, the image inspecting apparatus comprising: a receiving unit configured to receive the sheet ejected from the image forming unit; a reading unit configured to read the image formed on the sheet received by the receiving unit; an inspection unit configured to inspect the image read from the sheet by the reading unit; a sheet stack portion into which a plurality of sheets that are received from and read by the reading unit are stacked and configured to eject a stacked sheet from there to a tray, wherein a first sheet is stacked, before the inspection unit completes inspection of a read image from the first sheet, into the sheet stack portion temporarily to obtain time for the inspection unit that allows the inspection unit to complete inspecting the read image from the first sheet before the sheet stack portion ejects the stacked first sheet to the tray and without the image inspecting apparatus suspending a continuous image forming operation being performed by the image forming unit; and a control unit configured to output, in response to the plurality of sheets in the sheet stack portion reaching a number of sheets that is equal to a first predetermined value and before the sheet stack portion ejects a next stacked sheet, a sheet-ejection stop signal to the image forming unit, wherein the control unit outputs, in response to the plurality of sheets in the sheet stack portion first reaching the number of sheets that is equal to the first predetermined value and then falling to a number of sheets that is equal to a second predetermined value, a sheet-ejection resumption signal to the image forming unit, and acquires, after outputting the sheet-ejection resumption signal, image inspection results from the inspection unit.