Patent ID: 8843007

Claim:
An image forming apparatus, comprising: an image forming unit which forms an image on a paper based on image data; an image carrier on which a toner image is formed by the image forming unit; a patch image generation unit which generates a patch image for image density detection disposed between toner images of images formed consecutively on the image carrier; a patch density sensor which detects a density of the patch image generated by the patch image generation unit; a correction unit which performs correction processing to match a detected density and a target density by comparing the detected density of the patch image detected by the patch density sensor and the target density of the patch image which is set in advance; a toner deposit control unit which controls a toner deposit when the image forming unit forms the image based on the image data and when the patch image generation unit generates the patch image; and a paper interval control unit which controls an interval between consecutive papers, wherein in a case in which the toner deposit has been changed to be greater than a predetermined standard value and the patch image is to be generated by the patch image generation unit, the paper interval control unit executes a paper interval broadening processing to make the interval between consecutively conveyed papers be longer than a standard interval, and the toner deposit control unit executes a toner deposit changing processing to return the toner deposit to the predetermined standard value so that the patch image is formed with the predetermined standard value of the toner deposit.