Patent ID: 7701610

Claim:
An apparatus for making a printing apparatus print a plurality of pages with a plurality of recording agents including a dark recording agent and a light recording agent, the apparatus comprising: a first obtaining unit configured to obtain a density value corresponding to the dark recording agent and a density value corresponding to the light recording agent for each pixel; a second obtaining unit configured to obtain an amount of the dark recording agent that the printing apparatus will use, in the case that the dark recording agent is not substituted with the light recording agent, based on the obtained density value corresponding to the dark recording agent; a determining unit configured to determine whether the remaining amount of the light recording agent is less than the amount of the light recording agent that the printing apparatus will use to print each page in the case that the remaining amount of the dark recording agent is less than the obtained amount of the dark recording agent; a display unit for displaying thumbnail images of the plurality of pages when at least one of (i) the remaining amount of the dark recording agent is less than the obtained amount of the dark recording agent, and (ii) the remaining amount of the light recording agent is less than the amount of the light recording agent that the printing apparatus will use; a selection unit to receive a selection of at least one of the thumbnail images displayed on the display unit; and a making unit making the printing apparatus print one or more of the plurality of pages with the light recording agent in the case that the remaining amount of the light recording agent is not less than the amount of the light recording agent that the printing apparatus will use, wherein the making unit instructs the printing apparatus to print only those pages corresponding to the at least one thumbnail image selected via the selection unit, and does not instruct the printing unit to print any pages corresponding to unselected thumbnail images.