JP2001285632A - Printer control system and printer control method - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a printer control system and a printer control method that can conduct high quality printing by applying optimum image processing to each of image information for character and line drawing and image information for an image without the need for independently providing an image drawing area for characters and line drawings and an image drawing area for an image. SOLUTION: The printer control system (printer control section) relating to the form the of this embodiment substantially comprises a CPU 1, a print control section 2 and a memory (MEM) as shown in Figure 1. The memory 3 has an image drawing area 4 that stored image data 40 generate by the CPU 1. The print control section 2 applies image processing for high quality printing to the image data 40 received from the image drawing area 4 and gives the processed image to a print section 5.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a printer control method for a printing apparatus, and more particularly to a technique relating to a printer control system and a printer control method in which an image generating section is configured by multi-value data.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, a controller of a printer device draws, as the same type of information, data in which a photograph or image image and a character / line image are mixed in the same drawing area. In order to make this drawing information into a printed matter, image processing is performed as pre-processing of printing.However, although photograph and image image information and image information of characters and line drawings have different image processing methods suitable for each, Since character information and image information are mixed, image processing specialized in either one of them or image processing in which the influence of deterioration is reduced for both of them is performed.

More specifically, as means for improving the image quality, TEXT or Graphics type image information is subjected to an edge smoothing process for smoothing an edge portion, and image information of an image such as a photograph is processed. In such a case, it has been generally performed to perform a screen process for more expressing the color gradation.

[0004]

However, the prior art has the following problems. If a character or a line drawing has one bit, print information can be sufficiently expressed, and an image such as a photograph can sufficiently express print information with 7 bits in a printer. However, since the edge smoothing process and the screen process are mutually contradictory processes, when performing the smoothing process, the screen process is not sufficiently performed. On the other hand, when performing the screen processing, the edge smoothing processing cannot be performed. Therefore, in an image in which images such as characters and line drawings and images such as photographs are mixed, one of the print quality is sacrificed. As a result, when image processing is comprehensively determined, both character information and image information cannot be considered, and there is a problem that printed matter cannot be reproduced beautifully.

The present invention has been made in view of such a problem, and an object of the present invention is to provide a character / line drawing area and an image drawing area independently of each other. An object of the present invention is to provide a printer control system and a printer control method capable of performing high-quality printing by performing optimal image processing on image information for characters and line drawings and image information for images.

[0006]

The gist of the present invention is to provide a printer control system for pre-processing print data, wherein image information of an image or a photograph sent from a personal computer or the like, or text data. A CPU for generating image data composed of a plurality of pixels from the printing data having image information of a line drawing, a memory having a drawing area for storing the image data generated by the CPU, A print control unit that processes the image data input from the CPU and outputs the image data to a printing unit that performs printing. Each of the pixels that constitute the image data stored in the drawing area has a predetermined bit position. And an image image set by the number of bits and a character line image, and the image of the print data or the image information of the photograph is one or
Corresponding to a plurality of the image images, the image information of characters and line drawings of the print data corresponds to one or a plurality of the character and line image, and the print control unit is output from the drawing area. The printer control system is characterized in that the image data is subjected to a screen process based on a bit position and a bit number of the image image, and an edge smoothing process is performed based on the bit position and the bit number of the character / line image. The gist of the present invention described in claim 2 is that
2. The printer control system according to claim 1, wherein the pixels are composed of the image image set by upper 7 bits and the character line image set by lower 1 bits. . The gist of the present invention is that the CPU associates image information of characters and line drawings of the print data with lower one bit, and associates image information of images and photographs with upper seven bits. The printer control system according to claim 1, wherein the pixels are sequentially generated, and the image data including the pixels is stored in the drawing area of the memory. According to a fourth aspect of the present invention, there is provided a printing apparatus which performs image processing on print data transmitted from a personal computer or the like and outputs a printed matter, and the printer according to any one of the first to third aspects. The present invention resides in a printing device comprising a control system. The gist of the present invention described in claim 5 is that image information of an image or a photograph transmitted from a personal computer or the like,
A first step of generating image data composed of a plurality of pixels from printing data having image information of characters and line drawings and storing the image data in a drawing area of a memory; Outputting the image data from the drawing area in synchronization with the printing speed of the printing unit, the first step,
The image image and the character / line image are set in each of the pixels by a predetermined number of bits and bit positions, and one or a plurality of image images are included in the image of the print data and the image information of the photograph. And a step of associating one or a plurality of character line drawing images with image information of characters and line drawings of the printing data, wherein the second step is performed for each of the read pixels. Identifying the image image and the character / line image, performing a screen process for an image or a photograph on the image image, and performing an edge smoothing process on the character / line image. In the printer control method. The gist of the present invention according to claim 6 is that, in the first step, the image image is set to upper 7 bits of the pixel, and the character / line image is set to lower 1 bit of the pixel. The printer control method according to claim 5, wherein The gist of the present invention according to claim 7, wherein the screen processing is performed on upper 7 bits of each of the pixels, and the edge smoothing processing is performed on lower 1 bits of each of the pixels. A printer control method according to claim 5 or 6. Claim 8
The gist of the present invention resides in a storage medium storing a program capable of executing the printer control method according to any one of claims 5 to 7.

[0007]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below in detail with reference to the drawings. As shown in FIG. 1, a printer control system (printer control unit) according to the present embodiment
A schematically includes a CPU 1, a print control unit 2, and a memory (MEM) 3. The memory 3 has a drawing area 4 for storing image data 40 generated by the CPU 1. The print control unit 2 controls the image data 40 sent from the drawing area 4
Is subjected to image processing for high quality printing,
To send to.

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing a configuration of the image data 40 in the drawing area 4 of FIG. As shown in FIG.
The image data 40 generated by the PU 1 is composed of a plurality of pixels 48 each having image information, and is stored in the drawing area 4 formed on the memory 2.

The print data sent from a personal computer or the like has image information of images and photographs and image information of characters and line drawings. Each pixel 48 includes an image image 42 having image information of an image or a photograph, and a character / line image (character / line image) 46 having image information of a character or a line drawing. Each pixel 48 is composed of 8 bits,
The upper 7 bits correspond to the image image 42 and the lower 1 bit corresponds to the character / line image 46. The image of the print data and the image information of the photograph correspond to one or a plurality of image images 42. The character information and the line drawing image information of the printing data correspond to one or a plurality of character line drawing images 46.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an outline of processing of the image data 40 in the print control unit 2 of FIG. Print control unit 2
Inputs image data 40 stored in the drawing area 4 formed on the memory 3. The image data 40 includes, for each pixel 48, an image 4
2 and the character / line image 46 are output to the printing unit 5.

Next, a method using the printer control system A will be described with reference to FIG. The CPU 1 generates image data 40 from image information for printing,
In the drawing area 4. In each pixel 48 constituting the image data 40, the character and line drawing image 46 for characters and line drawings is made to correspond to the lower 1 bit, and the image 42 of the photograph or image is made to correspond to the upper 7 bits.

When outputting the image data 40 to the printing unit 5, the printing control unit 2 reads out the image data 40 from the drawing area 4 in synchronization with the printing speed of the printing unit 5.

At this time, image processing is performed on each pixel 40 in the image data 40 while discriminating between the image image 42 and the character / line image 46. That is, the upper 7 bits are subjected to screen processing for images and photographs, and the lower 1 bit is subjected to screen processing for characters and line drawings while being subjected to edge smoothing processing, and output to the printing unit 5. For example, when the lower one bit is “0”, only the screen processing of the image image 42 is performed, and when the lower one bit is “1”, the edge of the character line image 46 is discriminated. Only smoothing processing is performed.

Since the printer control system and the printer control method according to the embodiment are configured as described above,
The following effects are achieved.

By having the information of the character / line drawing image 46 for characters and line drawings and the image 42 of a photograph or image in each pixel, the processing of the image data in the print control unit becomes faster. In addition, the character line drawing image 42 and the image image 4
Since it is not necessary to store 6 in a separate drawing area, a memory area can be saved.

In this embodiment, the character line drawing image 42 and the image image 46 are made to correspond to each other by 8 bits.
Six bits (two pixels) can be used as one pixel unit. Furthermore, in consideration of saving the memory 2, a high-quality drawing area configured in units of bits is set in the memory 2 and image information is stored only for an image of a photograph or image. Printing corresponding to the capability of the input device is also possible.

Further, in the present embodiment, the present invention is not limited to this, and can be applied to a technique relating to a printer control system and a printer control method suitable for applying the present invention.

Further, the number, position, shape, etc. of the above-mentioned constituent members are not limited to the above-mentioned embodiment, but can be set to a suitable number, position, shape, etc. for carrying out the present invention.

In each of the drawings, the same components are denoted by the same reference numerals.

[0020]

Since the present invention is configured as described above, the following effects can be obtained. Without independently having image information for character and line drawing and image information for image in separate drawing areas, each pixel is constituted by an image image and a character and line drawing image corresponding to constituent bits, Considering both character information and image information,
High quality prints can be reproduced for high quality print data.

Further, since it is not necessary to store the character / line drawing image and the image image in separate drawing areas, a memory area can be saved, and the output of image data from the printing unit becomes faster.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an outline of a printer control system according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing a configuration of image data in a drawing area of FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating an outline of processing of image data in a print control unit in FIG. 1;

[Explanation of symbols]

 A Printer control system (printer control unit) 1 CPU 2 Print control unit 3 Memory (MEM) 4 Drawing area 5 Printing unit 40 Image data 42 Image image 46 Character line image 48 pixels (pixels)

 ──────────────────────────────────────────────────続 き Continued on the front page F term (reference) 2C087 AA16 AB05 BA03 BA05 BC02 BC05 BD12 BD13 BD24 BD46 5B021 AA01 BB05 DD09 LG08 5B057 AA11 CA01 CA08 CA12 CA16 CB01 CB08 CB12 CB16 CC01 CE05 CE20 CH01 CH11 CH18 CH04 MP06 MP10 PP02 PP23 PP28 PQ22 SS02 TT02 9A001 BB03 EE01 HH31 HH34 JJ35 KK42

Claims (8)

[Claims] 1. A printer control system for pre-processing print data, comprising: a plurality of print data having image information of an image or a photograph transmitted from a personal computer or the like, or print data having image information of characters and line drawings. A CPU for generating image data composed of pixels, a memory having a drawing area in which the image data generated by the CPU is stored, and processing the image data input from the drawing area,
A print control unit that outputs to a printing unit that performs printing, wherein each of the pixels that constitute the image data stored in the drawing area is an image image that is set by a predetermined bit position and a predetermined number of bits. , A character line drawing image, and the image information of the print data image and the photograph,
One or a plurality of the image images, the image information of characters and line drawings of the print data correspond to one or a plurality of the character and line images, and the print control unit A printer that performs a screen process on the image data output from the area based on a bit position and a bit number of the image image, and performs an edge smoothing process based on the bit position and the bit number of the character / line image. Control system. 2. The image processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the pixel is composed of the image image set by upper 7 bits and the character line drawing image set by lower 1 bit. Printer control system. 3. The image processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the CPU associates image information of characters and line drawings of the print data with lower 1-bit data, and converts image information of images and photos into upper 7 bits.
The printer control system according to claim 1, wherein the pixels are sequentially generated in correspondence with bits, and the image data including the pixels is stored in the drawing area of the memory. 4. A printing apparatus for performing image processing on print data sent from a personal computer or the like and outputting a printed matter, comprising a printer control system according to claim 1. Characteristic printing device. 5. An image data composed of a plurality of pixels is generated from image data of an image or a photograph transmitted from a personal computer or the like or print data having image information of a character or a line drawing. And outputting the image data to a printing unit for performing printing.
A second step of reading out the image data from the drawing area in synchronization with a printing speed of the printing unit, wherein the first step includes, in each of the pixels, the image image and the character line drawing image. A predetermined number of bits and a bit position are set, and one or a plurality of image images are made to correspond to the image information of the image or the photograph of the print data, and the image information of the character or the line drawing of the print data is set. , 1
And a step of associating one or a plurality of character line drawing images, wherein the second step identifies the image image and the character line drawing image for each of the read pixels, and A printer control method comprising: performing a screen process for an image or a photograph on an image; and performing an edge smoothing process on the character / line image. 6. The method according to claim 1, wherein the first step includes a step of setting the image image to upper 7 bits of the pixel and a step of setting the character / line image to lower 1 bit of the pixel. A printer control method according to claim 5. 7. The method according to claim 5, wherein the screen processing is performed on upper 7 bits of each of the pixels, and the edge smoothing processing is performed on lower one bits of each of the pixels. 7. The printer control method according to 6. 8. A storage medium on which a program capable of executing the printer control method according to claim 5 is recorded.