Patent ID: 7602411

Claim:
An image forming apparatus comprising: an inputting section through which halftone data of pixels is received from an external device, the halftone data being defined by a number of bits; and a dot forming section that irradiates a charged surface of an image bearing body with light to form a plurality of dots in accordance with the halftone data of the pixels, the plurality of dots being aligned in a first direction and in a second direction substantially perpendicular to the first direction, the plurality of dots forming a plurality of lines of dots in the first direction, the second direction being a direction of travel of a print medium onto which images of the plurality of dots in the first and second directions are transferred from the image bearing body; wherein dots in each one of the plurality of lines of dots in the first direction have a same exposure energy different from exposure energies of dots in the remaining ones of the plurality of lines of dots in the first direction; wherein a plurality of dots aligned in a single line in the second direction are combined to form a single pixel having a halftone level described by the halftone data, each of the dots aligned in the single line being formed by an amount of exposure energy defined by a corresponding bit among the number of bits.