Patent ID: 7918521

Claim:
A droplet ejecting apparatus comprising: a droplet ejecting head for ejecting droplets onto a recording medium; a moving unit for moving the recording medium relative to the droplet ejecting head; an output unit for outputting a pulse signal which is generated along with moving of the moving unit and which has a pulse width comprising a cyclic fluctuation; a reference position detection unit for detecting a reference position in the cyclic fluctuation; a pattern memory for storing image information of a detection pattern comprising a plurality of unit patterns which are set in advance; a reading unit for reading an image formed on the recording medium; a detection pattern output unit that drives the droplet ejecting head based on the pulse signal outputted from the output unit and the image information of the detection pattern stored in the pattern memory when a detection pattern output instruction is present; a correction information generating unit that makes the reading unit read an image on the recording medium on which the detection pattern image is formed by the detection pattern output unit, derives a distance between the unit patterns adjacent each other based on the image read by the reading unit, compares the distance with a distance according to a conveyance velocity of the recording medium by the moving unit, and generates correction information so as to enlarge the pulse width when the derived distance is shorter than the distance according to the conveyance velocity, and to reduce the pulse width when the derived distance is longer than the distance according to the conveyance velocity; a memory that stores the correction information generated by the correction information generating unit; a correction unit for correcting the pulse width of the pulse signal outputted from the output unit based on a detection timing of the reference position by the reference position detection unit and the correction information stored in the memory; and a head controller for forming an image according to image information on the recording medium by controlling the droplet ejecting timing of the droplet ejection head using the pulse signal corrected by the correction unit.