Patent ID: 8274673

Claim:
An image reading apparatus, comprising: a document conveying section which sequentially conveys a plurality of documents while providing clearances between the documents in a document conveying direction; a first reading section which performs a reading operation at a predetermined first reading position in a main scanning direction with respect to a document which passes through the first reading position in a sub-scanning direction; a first reading controller which controls the first reading section to perform a reading operation for reading an image of the clearance when the clearance passes through the first reading position; a first determining section which determines presence or absence of a foreign object at the first reading position in accordance with image data obtained by the reading operation based on an instruction from the first reading controller; a second reading controller which controls the first reading section to perform a reading operation for reading a document image when the document passes through the first reading position; a foreign object image removing processor which removes a foreign object image, which is caused by a foreign object adhered at the first reading position, from an image obtained by the reading operation based on an instruction from the second reading controller; a changing section changes the reading position of the first reading section to a second reading position which is different from the first reading position; an image data creating mode selecting section which receives an instruction of selecting a mode from among a first image data creating mode and a second image data creating mode, the first image data creating mode being adapted for obtaining image data by allowing the first reading section to perform the reading operation at the first reading position and allowing the foreign object image removing processor to execute the foreign object image removing processing with respect to the image data obtained by the reading operation if the first determining section determines that the foreign object is present, the second image data creating mode being adapted for obtaining image data by allowing the first reading section to perform the reading operation at the second reading position without allowing the foreign object image removing processor to execute the foreign object image removing processing with respect to the image data obtained by the reading operation if the first determining section determines that the foreign object is present; and a mode setting section which performs setting of the reading operation and the image creating operation in any one of the selected modes with respect to each section necessary for executing the first image data creating mode or the second image data creating mode selected in accordance with the instruction received by the image data creating mode selecting section.