Patent ID: 7762642

Claim:
A method of calibrating a media advance in a printer, the printer including an array of marking elements that are disposed along a direction that is substantially parallel to a direction of media advance, the method comprising: providing a mask to specify a printing configuration of a calibration target; forming a media feed calibration target on a print media by: i. printing the calibration target on the print media using the array of the marking elements, ii. advancing the print media by a media advance amount, iii. printing the calibration target on the print media using the array of the marking elements; iv. advancing the print media by the previous media advance amount plus an offset amount, and v. repeating steps iii. and iv. until the media feed calibration target is complete; measuring the optical reflectance of the media feed calibration target as a function of position along the media advance direction; identifying a position of the media feed calibration target to the location at which a maximum in the optical reflectance occurs; and comparing the location at which a maximum in the optical reflectance occurs to a predetermined location of the media feed calibration target along the media advance direction to calibrate media advance in the printer.