Patent ID: 8885223

Claim:
An apparatus comprising: a controller configured to (i) receive a continuous tone image, and (ii) generate a halftone image corresponding to the continuous tone image, wherein the halftone image comprises an array of a plurality of pixels, wherein the array comprises a plurality of microcells, wherein each microcell of the plurality of microcells comprises a respective group of pixels of the plurality of pixels, and wherein the controller comprises a table module configured to, for each microcell of the plurality of microcells, assign to the pixels included in the corresponding microcell a respective microcell offset factor, a microcell table module configured to, for each pixel in each microcell of the plurality of microcells, assign a respective pixel offset factor that is associated with a relative position of the pixel in the respective microcell, wherein for each microcell, the pixel offset factors associated with the pixels of the corresponding microcell are associated with an order in which the pixels within the microcell are darkened while generating the halftone images, a cell generation module configured to determine, for each pixel of the plurality of pixels of the array, a respective final offset factor, wherein the final offset factor of a given pixel of the plurality of pixels is based on a relative location of the given pixel in the array, and wherein the final offset factor of the given pixel of the plurality of pixels is based at least in part on the respective microcell offset factor assigned to the given pixel, and a halftone image generation module configured to generate the halftone image to include the plurality of pixels such that an order in which individual pixels within the array is darkened, while generating halftone image, is based on the final offset factor of each pixel of the plurality of pixels.