Patent ID: 7223511

Claim:
A developing method comprising steps of: carrying a one-component developer contained in a developer container onto a developer carrying member in the form of a layer; conveying the developer by the developer carrying member to a developing region opposed to the electrostatic latent image carrying member; forming a toner image with the one-component developer that has been conveyed by developing the electrostatic latent image carried on the electrostatic latent image carrying member, wherein the developer carrying member has at least a substrate and a resin-coated layer formed on the substrate; the resin-coated layer contains at least a binder resin, graphitized particles and roughing particles; the graphitized particles have 0.20 to 0.95 of graphitization degree (p (002)); and the graphitized particles have 0.5 to 4.0 μm of volume-average particle size in the resin-coated layer and the roughing particles have 5.5 to 20.0 μm of volume-average particle size and not less than 0.75 of average circularity SF-1; and wherein in the surface configuration of the resin-coated layer as measured by use of focusing optical laser, the volume (B) of a microtopographical region defined by a certain area (A) of the microtopographical region without convexity formed by the roughing particles meets the following relationship: 4.5≦B/A≦6.5; and the resin-coated layer has 0.9 to 2.5 μm of arithmetic mean roughness (Ra).