Patent ID: 7369152

Claim:
A laser marking method of forming, on a photosensitive material, a marking pattern of one of characters, symbols, and a character array in which one of characters and symbols are continuous, by an arrangement of dots formed by illuminating laser light, which is oscillated by a laser oscillator, while conveying the photosensitive material, said method comprising: starting oscillation of the laser light by the laser oscillator before illumination of the laser light onto the photosensitive material; and after an oscillation output of the laser oscillator is stabilized, forming the marking pattern on the photosensitive material by illuminating the laser light onto the photosensitive material while deflecting the laser light by a deflector in accordance with the marking pattern; stopping the illumination of the laser light onto the photosensitive material when the conveying of the photosensitive material has stopped; resuming the illumination of the laser light onto the photosensitive material when the conveying of the photosensitive material is resumed; determining whether a redetermined period of time has passed since the conveying of the photosensitive material has stopped without resuming the conveying of the photosensitive material; and stopping the oscillation of the laser light when it is determined that the predetermined period of time has passed since the photosensitive material has stopped without resuming the conveying of the photosensitive material.