Patent ID: 8517496

Claim:
An apparatus comprising: a sheet feeding unit configured to feed a continuous sheet along a path, wherein the continuous sheet includes a leading sheet connected to a following sheet by a splice; a print head unit of an inkjet-type configured to print adjustment patterns and images on the continuous sheet fed from the sheet feeding unit; a detecting unit configured to detect the splice of the continuous sheet at a position between the sheet feeding unit and the print head unit in the path; a reading unit configured to read adjustment patterns on the continuous sheet printed by the print head unit; and an adjusting unit configured to perform an image-quality adjustment of the print head unit, wherein, in response to the splice being detected by the detecting unit, the adjusting unit performs an image-quality adjustment by obtaining information regarding a recordable area of the following sheet and using the obtained information to perform image-quality adjustment of the print head unit that is at least one of a color shading adjustment, a distance adjustment of a gap between the print head unit and the continuous sheet, and a color registration adjustment of the print head unit, wherein the adjusting unit causes the print head unit to print adjustment patterns on a leading area of the following sheet and causes the reading unit to read the adjustment patterns to obtain read image data as the information, the image-quality adjustment being performed based on the read image data, and wherein the adjusting unit further obtains information regarding a recordable area of the leading sheet and, in response to a difference between the information regarding the recordable area of the following sheet and the information regarding the recordable area of the leading sheet, the adjusting unit performs control to print images on the following sheet such that differences between print qualities at portions of the leading sheet in front of the splice and of the following sheet behind the splice are reduced due to the image-quality adjustment.