JP2004130647A - Handy type printing system, printing device and printing medium - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To make compact a handy type printing device for a rewritable printing medium and to enhance a printing quality. <P>SOLUTION: A label 1 to be the printing medium has a write region 10 set at a surface of a carrier 20. A ladder pattern 15 to be printing reference position information is printed at the write region 10 by a white color material which does not discolor. The write region 10 is set by coloring the surface of the carrier 20 with a color material which generates black color in a normal coloring state. The color material has the feature so that a part where heat is applied by a printing process by a handy printer is turned white and is returned to the normal coloring state by an erasing process. When the handy printer is moved on the label 1, a position detecting part reads the ladder pattern 15 and generates a ladder input pulse. A control part generates a printing reference pulse on the basis of the ladder input pulse, and at the same time, forms and transmits a printing signal on the basis of printing data and the printing reference pulse to a TPH 70 to perform printing. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2004,JPO

Description

[0001]
TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a printing system, specifically, a hand-held printing system, a printing apparatus, and a printing medium.
[0002]
[Prior art]
Conventionally, when printing contents on paper or other printing media by a printing device such as a printer used in an office, a printing position reference is provided in a printer printing medium transfer mechanism, and printing is performed based on this reference. There is known one that determines a position to be printed on a medium. The same applies to a printing device used for a fixed-size label or the like.
[0003]
On the other hand, in the case of a handy type printer that does not have a print medium transfer mechanism, that is, a printing device that performs printing by moving the printing device over the printing medium, the rotation of the roller is normally detected using an encoder, and the printing position is determined. A reference encoder pulse or the like is acquired to determine a printing position (for example, see Patent Document 1).
[0004]
However, a handy-type printing apparatus using a roller requires a roller and a mechanism for providing the roller, and thus has a problem that the size cannot be reduced and the cost cannot be reduced.
[0005]
Thus, for example, Patent Document 2 proposes a method of using a print medium on which a dot pattern indicating a reference of a print position is drawn as a whole, and reading the dot pattern during printing to determine a print position.
[0006]
[Patent Document 1]
JP-A-7-195724
[Patent Document 2]
WO 01/74598 A1 [0008]
[Problems to be solved by the invention]
However, in the method described in Patent Document 2, the dot pattern indicating the reference of the printing position entirely drawn on the print medium remains on the print medium even after printing characters and images, and the print quality is low. In addition to lowering, once printing is performed, a dot pattern serving as position information is filled with the print content and cannot be used as print position information, so that there is a problem that it cannot be applied to a rewritable print medium that repeats printing and erasing.
[0009]
The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and it is an object of the present invention to provide a handy-type printing system and a printing apparatus capable of performing high-quality printing on a rewritable print medium, and a rewritable print medium therefor. .
[0010]
[Means for Solving the Problems]
The handy-type printing system of the present invention is a printing medium having printing reference position information indicating a reference of a printing position,
Print reference position information reading means for reading the print reference position information as it is moved on the print medium,
A handy-type printing system comprising: a printing unit that performs a printing process according to a printing reference position read by the printing reference position information reading unit,
The print medium is a rewritable print medium capable of erasing the print content printed by the print processing,
The image processing apparatus further comprises an erasing means capable of erasing the print content.
[0011]
That is, the handy-type printing system of the present invention is for performing printing on a rewritable printing medium.Instead of using a roller, printing reference position information is provided on the printing medium, and the printing is performed by the printing reference position information reading means. The print position is determined by acquiring the reference position information.
[0012]
Further, the rewritable printing medium in the handy type printing system of the present invention has an encoder pattern portion in which an encoder pattern is printed with a pattern color material of a first color as the printing reference position information, and a second color in a normally colored state. It has a writing part which is obtained by coloring a writing part coloring material emitting on a carrier.
The first color is different from the second color,
The writing portion color material changes color from the second color in the normal coloring state to a third color different from the second color by the printing process, and the third color is erased by the erasing means. To return to the normal colored state from
It is preferable that the printing unit performs printing by partially changing the color of the writing unit according to the print content to be printed.
[0013]
Here, "partially discoloring" may be processing for discoloring so that the printed content can be understood as a result. For example, when the printed content is a character "A", the In addition to discoloring only the portion corresponding to the character "A", the other portion excluding the portion corresponding to "A" may be discolored so that the character "A" is printed as a result. Good.
[0014]
In addition, the “third color” means a color emitted by the writing unit after the writing unit color material changes from the second color by the printing process, and the writing unit color material is In the case where the third color is not changed to be transparent by the printing process, the third color is the color after the discoloration of the writing portion color material, but in the case where the writing portion color material is substantially transparent by the printing process, This third color will be the color of the carrier, since the writing section will emit the color of the carrier.
[0015]
The color material of the encoder pattern of the rewritable print medium in the hand-held printing system of the present invention preferably emits the same color as the third color, that is, the first color and the third color. Preferably, the colors are similar.
[0016]
The printing apparatus of the present invention is a handy-type printing apparatus that performs printing on a rewritable print medium having printing reference position information indicating a printing position reference,
Print reference position information reading means for reading the print reference position information as it is moved on the print medium,
Printing means for performing a printing process according to the printing reference position read by the printing reference position information reading means,
And an erasing means for erasing the print content printed by the printing process.
[0017]
The print medium of the present invention is a rewritable print medium for a handy-type printing device,
A printing reference position information section in which printing reference position information indicating a reference of a position to be printed on the handy-type printing device is printed,
A writing unit for printing processing by the handy-type printing device,
The print reference position information section is an encoder pattern section in which an encoder pattern is printed with a pattern color material of a first color as the print reference position information,
The writing section is formed by coloring a writing section coloring material that emits a second color in a normally colored state on a carrier,
The first color is different from the second color.
[0018]
The writing portion coloring material of the print medium of the present invention is changed from the second color in the normal coloring state to a third color different from the second color by the printing process, and is subjected to a predetermined erasing process to change the color. It is possible to return from the third color to the normal colored state, and in this case, it is preferable that the first color is the same color as the third color.
[0019]
【The invention's effect】
INDUSTRIAL APPLICABILITY The handy-type printing system and the printing apparatus of the present invention can be applied to a rewritable print medium because the print contents are erased by erasing processing and the print reference position information remains. Further, the printing reference position information written on the printing medium is made inconspicuous with the color of the writing area that has been changed in color at the same time as printing, so that the printing quality is good.
[0020]
BEST MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION
Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.
[0021]
FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating a configuration of a printing system according to a first embodiment of the present invention. As illustrated, the printing system of the present embodiment includes a label 1 serving as a print medium and a handy printer 50 that prints on the label 1. The handy printer 50 is moved over the label 1. As a result, the label 1 is printed.
[0022]
2 and 3 show the configurations of the label 1 and the handy printer 50, respectively.
[0023]
FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram showing the configuration of the label 1, and FIGS. 2 (a) and 2 (b) are a plan view and a side view, respectively. As shown in FIG. 2, the label 1 has a writing area 10 provided on the surface of a carrier 20, and a ladder pattern 15 serving as an encoder pattern is printed on the writing area 10. The writing area 10 is formed by coloring the surface of the carrier 20 with a predetermined coloring material.
[0024]
The ladder pattern 15 emits white, and is printed with a color material having a property of not changing its color even when a printing process and an erasing process are performed by a handy printer 50 (the details thereof will be described later). The coloring material in the writing area 10 normally emits black in a colored state, and the portion heated by the printing process by the handy printer 50 (the details of which will be described later) changes to white, while the erasing process by the handy printer 50. Has the property of returning to a normally colored state, that is, black.
[0025]
FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing a configuration of the handy printer 50 in the printing system shown in FIG. As illustrated, the handy printer 50 includes a storage unit 55 that stores print data, a position detection unit 65 that reads a ladder pattern on the label 1 and generates a print reference pulse, and a thermal head (hereinafter abbreviated as TPH). The control unit 60 controls the control unit 70 to perform printing on the label 1, and the TPH 70 performs printing by partially applying heat to the label 1 under the control of the control unit 60. The control unit 60 also causes the TPH 70 to perform an erasing process for erasing the content printed on the label 1.
[0026]
The position detection unit 65 of the handy printer 50 illustrated in FIG. 3 includes a light emitting device including a laser diode (not illustrated), a light receiving sensor that receives reflected light from the label 1 in response to irradiation of a laser beam emitted from the light emitting device, A ladder input pulse shown in FIG. 4 is generated based on the reflected light from the label 1 (specifically, the ladder pattern 15) received by the light receiving sensor, and a printing reference pulse shown in the figure is generated in accordance with the ladder input pulse. And a reference pulse generator for generating the reference pulse. The pulse interval of the ladder input pulse shown in FIG. 4 is determined by the ladder pattern 15 printed on the label 1 and the moving speed of the handy printer 50.
[0027]
The control section 60 generates a print signal shown in FIG. 4 based on the print reference pulse generated by the position detection section 65 and the print data stored in the storage section 55, and controls the TPH 70 according to the print signal. Is generated and output to the TPH 70 for printing. In the present embodiment, the control unit 60 determines the portion of the print content on the label 1 (for example, when the print content is “rewritable”, the portion corresponding to the portion of the label 1 where “rewritable” is to be printed) The TPH 70 is controlled so as not to apply heat to the other portions but to apply heat to other portions. As a result, the portion of the printed content does not change color and is the color (black) of the coloring material constituting the writing area 10 of the label 1 in the normally colored state, whereas the portion other than the printed content is the ladder pattern 15 of the label 1. The color changes to the same color (white) as. FIG. 5 shows a result obtained by printing the character “Rewritable” by the handy printer 50.
[0028]
FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing a printing operation of the printing system according to the first embodiment of the present invention shown in FIG. As shown in the drawing, the printing operation of the printing system according to the first embodiment shown in FIG. 1 starts when the handy printer 50 is manually moved on the label 1 (S10). Along with the movement of the handy printer 50, the position detecting unit 65 emits a laser beam by a light emitting device (not shown), and receives a laser beam by a light receiving sensor (not shown). The laser beam is reflected from the ladder pattern 15 of the label 1 by the irradiation of the laser beam. A ladder input pulse is generated based on the reflected light (S12). The control unit 60 of the handy printer 50 generates a print reference pulse in accordance with the ladder input pulse generated by the position detection unit 65 (S14), reads out print data from the storage unit 35, and prints the print data and the print reference pulse. A print signal is generated based on the above (S16). The control unit 60 further generates a control signal for causing the TPH 70 to perform printing based on the print signal and transmits the control signal to the TPH 70, and the TPH 70 performs printing according to the control signal from the control unit 60 (S18).
[0029]
The printing operation by the printing system shown in FIG. 1 has been described above. As described above, the handy printer 50 in the printing system shown in FIG. 1 performs the printing process on the label 1 and erases the printed content. It can also be. Specifically, in erasing the content printed on the label 1 by the user (for example, the character portion of “rewritable” shown in FIG. 5), the handy printer 50 is operated at a predetermined speed for erasing (a speed lower than when printing). When the label 1 is moved over the label 1, the color material forming the writing area 10 of the label 1 returns to the normal colored state, that is, returns to black, while the ladder pattern 15 remains white. The state returns to the state where nothing is printed as shown in FIG.
[0030]
As described above, according to the printing system of the first embodiment of the present invention shown in FIG. 1, the label 1 on which the ladder pattern 15 serving as the printing position information is printed is used as a print medium, and the ladder pattern 15 is read. Since the printing position is determined, there is no need to use a roller as in a conventional hand-held printing device, so that the printing device can be reduced in size and only the print content is erased by an erasing process. It can be applied to rewritable print media.
[0031]
The label 1 of the printing medium used in the printing system shown in FIG. 1 has the ladder pattern 15 serving as the printing position information printed in the same white color as the portion where the writing area 10 has changed color. After printing, the color of the ladder pattern 15 is assimilated with the color of the discolored writing area 10 serving as the background, as shown in FIG. 5, so that the ladder pattern 15 is inconspicuous and beautiful.
[0032]
As described above, the preferred embodiment of the present invention has been described. However, the handy-type printing system, the printing apparatus, and the print medium of the present invention are not limited to the embodiment shown in FIG. 1 and unless the gist of the present invention is changed. Various changes can be made.
[0033]
For example, in the printing system according to the first embodiment of the present invention shown in FIG. 1, the handy printer 50 itself stores print data in the storage unit 55, controls the TPH 70 that performs printing and erasing, and controls the position detection unit 65. Has a configuration including a control unit 60 that generates a print signal based on the ladder input pulse and print data generated by the method described above. However, even if the present invention is applied to a print system as shown in FIG. Good.
[0034]
FIG. 7 is a schematic block diagram illustrating a configuration of a printing system according to the second embodiment of the present invention. As shown, in the printing system, the label 1 is the same as the label 1 used in the printing system shown in FIG. 1, and the handy printer 50a is the same as the handy printer 50 in the printing system of FIG. The computer 100 includes the TPH 70 and the position detection unit 65, but does not include the control unit 60 of the handy printer 50 in the printing system of FIG. 1, and controls the TPH 70 and generates a print signal. In addition to the control of the TPH 70, the computer 100 also creates print data to be printed by the handy printer 50a, and outputs the created print data to the handy printer 50a for printing. Note that the communication between the computer 100 and the handy printer 50 may be any of wired and wireless systems.
[0035]
FIG. 8 is a schematic block diagram illustrating a configuration of a printing system according to the third embodiment of the present invention. As shown, in the printing system, the label 1 is the same as the label 1 used in the printing system shown in FIGS. 1 and 7, and the handy printer 50b is the same as the handy printer 50a shown in FIG. On the other hand, processing such as control of the TPH 70 and generation of a print signal is performed by the controller 80. The print data may be stored in the controller 80 or the handy printer 50b by providing a storage unit, or input means may be provided in the handy printer 50b or the controller 80 so that the print data can be input from outside. It may be.
[0036]
It goes without saying that the printing system of the embodiment shown in FIGS. 7 and 8 can obtain the same effects as those of the printing system of the first embodiment of the present invention shown in FIG.
[0037]
The handy printers 50, 50a, and 50b are configured so that the thermal head 70 has both functions of printing and erasing. However, the thermal head 70 is dedicated to printing, and a heating plate or the like is additionally provided for erasing only. You may make it.
[Brief description of the drawings]
FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a printing system according to a first embodiment of the present invention; FIG. 2 is a diagram showing a configuration of a label 1 serving as a printing medium in the printing system shown in FIG. 1 FIG. FIG. 4 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a handy printer 50 in the printing system. FIG. 4 is a diagram for explaining operations of a position detection unit 65 and a control unit 60 in the printing system shown in FIG. 1. FIG. FIG. 6 is a diagram showing an example of a printing result according to the embodiment. FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing a printing operation of the printing system shown in FIG. 1. FIG. 7 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a printing system according to a second embodiment of the present invention. FIG. 3 is a block diagram illustrating a configuration of a printing system according to a third embodiment of the present invention.
1 Label 10 Writing area 15 Ladder pattern 20 Carrier 50, 50a, 50b Handy printer 55 Storage unit 60 Control unit 65 Position detection unit 70 Thermal head 80 Controller 100 Computer TPH Thermal head

Claims (7)

A print medium having printing reference position information indicating a reference of a printing position,
Print reference position information reading means for reading the print reference position information as it is moved on the print medium,
A handy-type printing system comprising: a printing unit that performs a printing process according to a printing reference position read by the printing reference position information reading unit,
The print medium is a rewritable print medium capable of erasing the print content printed by the print processing,
A hand-held printing system further comprising an erasing means capable of erasing the printed content. The print medium has an encoder pattern portion formed by printing an encoder pattern with a first color pattern color material as the print reference position information and a writing portion color material that emits a second color in a normally colored state on a carrier. It has a writing portion colored to
The first color is different from the second color,
The writing portion color material changes color from the second color in the normal coloring state to a third color different from the second color by the printing process, and the third color is erased by the erasing means. To return to the normal colored state from
2. A hand-held printing system according to claim 1, wherein said printing means performs printing by partially changing a color of said writing section in accordance with a print content to be printed. The hand-held printing system according to claim 2, wherein the first color is a color similar to the third color. A hand-held printing apparatus that performs printing on a rewritable print medium having printing reference position information indicating a reference of a printing position,
Print reference position information reading means for reading the print reference position information as it is moved on the print medium,
Printing means for performing a printing process according to the printing reference position read by the printing reference position information reading means,
And a erasing means for erasing the printed content printed by the printing process. A rewritable printing medium for a handy-type printing device,
A printing reference position information section in which printing reference position information indicating a reference of a position to be printed on the handy-type printing device is printed,
A writing unit for printing processing by the handy-type printing device,
The print reference position information section is an encoder pattern section in which an encoder pattern is printed with a pattern color material of a first color as the print reference position information,
The writing section is formed by coloring a writing section coloring material that emits a second color in a normally colored state on a carrier,
The print medium, wherein the first color is different from the second color. The writing portion color material changes color from the second color in the normal coloring state to a third color different from the second color by the printing process, and changes the color from the third color by a predetermined erasing process. The print medium according to claim 5, wherein the print medium returns to a normal colored state. The print medium according to claim 6, wherein the first color is the same color as the third color.

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