JP2008005152A - Image forming apparatus, image forming program and image forming substance - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To perform pattern printing, without having to rely on the density of a pattern, or on the individual difference in performance of a copy machine or the setting thereof. <P>SOLUTION: The image forming apparatus comprises a printing section 125 for printing patterns with high reflectance toner, and a CPU 121 constituting the operation control means of the printing section 125. When patterned printing for embedding a pattern in a document image to be copying prohibited is specified based on set information, the CPU 121 determines whether use of high reflectance toner is specified in the patterned printing; and if use of high reflectance toner is specified, a pattern is embedded in a document image desired to be copying prohibited and the printing section 125 is controlled to print the pattern with high reflectance toner. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2008,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention provides an image forming apparatus, an image forming processing program, and an image forming function having a function of printing a copy-forgery-inhibited pattern pattern on a sheet together with print data, which is not conspicuous in the original and makes a predetermined pattern appear on the copy when the copy is taken Related to things.

  In recent years, with the development of copy technology, the quality of copies has advanced, and it has become possible to obtain copies that are very close to the original. However, on the other hand, there is a problem that the copied material is illegally used, and a technique that can distinguish the original from the copied material has been desired.

  There has been proposed a technique for suppressing copying by embedding a background pattern in an original image for which copying is prohibited. This is to use a sheet on which a background pattern having a base area and a message area is created on the background of the sheet used for the original image. The copy-forgery-inhibited pattern does not stand out so much in the original image, and does not hinder the interpretation of information included in the original image. However, when a document image in which such a tint block pattern is embedded is copied, for example, a message area pattern emerges as shown in FIG.

  Therefore, by giving characters such as “copy prohibited” as the pattern of the message area, it becomes obvious at a glance that the copied material was a confidential document prohibited from copying. Can be generated.

Japanese National Patent Publication No. 11-502954 Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2003-091518

  By the way, if the copy-forgery-inhibited pattern is not printed at an appropriate density, for example, as shown in FIG. 11, characters appear as they are copied and are not printed, or if the density is high when copying, or the gradation is high. In some cases, characters may appear and may not be printed.

  SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION An object of the present invention is to make it possible to perform tint block printing without depending on the density of the tint block pattern and without depending on individual performance differences and settings of the copying machine.

  Other objects of the present invention and specific advantages obtained by the present invention will become more apparent from the description of embodiments described below.

  The present invention is an image forming apparatus having a copy-forgery-inhibited pattern addition printing function for embedding a copy-forgery-inhibited pattern in a document image to be prohibited from being copied. Control means for controlling the use of high-reflectance toner for the copy-forgery-inhibited pattern print when the copy-forgery-inhibited pattern print for embedding the copy-forgery-inhibited pattern is specified based on the setting information. If the use of high-reflectance toner is specified, the background pattern is embedded in the original image to be prohibited from being copied, and the print processing means is controlled to make the background pattern highly reflective. It is characterized by printing with a percentage toner.

  In the image forming apparatus according to the present invention, for example, when the use of high-reflectance toner is specified, the control unit determines whether or not a character to be printed with a tint block is a hollow character and performs printing. When the character is a hollow character, the background processing additional printing is performed by the print processing means using the high reflectance toner for the character portion embedded in the background pattern and the white background portion.

  In the image forming apparatus according to the present invention, for example, when the use of high-reflectance toner is designated, the control unit determines whether or not a character to be printed with a tint block is a hollow character, When the character to be printed is not a hollow character, high-reflectivity toner is used in the space between the pattern portion of the background pattern and the character portion embedded in the background pattern, and the background processing additional printing is performed by the print processing unit.

  The present invention is an image forming processing program for executing copy-forgery-inhibited pattern printing in which a copy-forgery-inhibited pattern is embedded in a manuscript image to be prohibited from being copied. It is characterized in that a copy-forgery-inhibited pattern printing is performed in which use is specified, a copy-forgery-inhibited pattern is embedded in a document image to be prohibited from being copied, and the copy-forgery-inhibited pattern is printed with high-reflectance toner.

  In the image forming processing program according to the present invention, for example, it is determined whether or not the character to be printed with the copy-forgery-inhibited pattern is a hollow character, and if the character to be printed is a hollow character, the character embedded in the ground pattern Background pattern addition printing is performed using high-reflectance toner on the part and the white part.

  Further, in the image forming processing program according to the present invention, for example, it is determined whether or not the character to be printed with the copy-forgery-inhibited pattern is a hollow character, and when the character to be printed is not a hollow character, Background pattern addition printing is performed using high-reflectivity toner in the gaps between character portions embedded in the background pattern.

  The image-formed product according to the present invention is characterized in that a copy-forgery-inhibited pattern is printed by embedding a copy-forgery-inhibited pattern with toner having a high reflectance such as silver in an original image to be prohibited from being copied.

  In the image-formed product according to the present invention, for example, the characters embedded in the background pattern printed with the background pattern are hollow characters, and the background portion and the white background portion are additionally printed with the background pattern using high reflectance toner. Become.

  In addition, in the image formed product according to the present invention, for example, the characters embedded in the background pattern printed with the background pattern added are not hollow characters, and the high reflectance is applied to the space between the pattern portion of the background pattern and the character portion embedded in the background pattern. It is printed with a tint block using toner.

  According to the present invention, tint block printing can be performed without depending on the density of the tint block pattern. Also, copy-forgery-inhibited pattern printing can be performed without depending on individual performance differences and settings of the copying machine.

  Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings. Needless to say, the present invention is not limited to the following examples, and can be arbitrarily changed without departing from the gist of the present invention.

  As shown in FIG. 1, for example, the present invention is a printing system in which a client 110 for which a user instructs printing and an image forming apparatus (printing machine) 120 are connected via a network 130 such as a LAN so that they can communicate with each other. 100. Note that the image forming apparatus 120 may be directly connected to the client 110 via a USB interface or a parallel interface without via the network 130.

  The client 110 is, for example, a so-called personal computer, and as shown in FIG. 2, a CPU 111 for controlling the entire apparatus and various arithmetic processes, a ROM 112 for storing programs and data, and a program and data temporarily as a work area. RAM 113 for storing various data, a hard disk 114 as an external storage device for storing various programs and data, a display unit 115 such as a liquid crystal display for displaying various information, and a keyboard and mouse for inputting various instructions An input unit 116 including a network interface 117 such as a LAN card for connecting to the network 130 is connected to each other via a bus 118.

  In addition, as shown in the block diagram of FIG. 3, the image forming apparatus 120 includes a CPU 121 that controls the entire apparatus and various arithmetic processes, a ROM 122 that stores programs and data, and temporarily stores programs and data as work areas. A variety of data is printed on a recording material such as a sheet using a RAM 123 for storing, an operation panel unit 124 used for displaying various information and inputting various instructions, and a known image forming process such as an electrophotographic process. The printing unit 125 and the network interface 126 such as a LAN card for connecting to the network 130 are connected to each other via a bus 127.

  For example, as shown in FIG. 4, the printing unit 125 in the image forming apparatus 120 includes a main charging unit 211, a developing unit 212, a photosensitive drum 213, a transfer unit 214, and a cleaning unit for performing normal printing processing using black toner. A charging unit 221, a developing unit 222, a photosensitive drum 223, a transfer unit 224, a cleaning unit 225, and a discharging unit 226 for performing copy-forgery-inhibited pattern printing using silver toner. The photosensitive drums 213 and 223 are arranged to face the transfer units 214 and 224 with the conveyance belt 230 that conveys the photographic paper interposed therebetween.

  In the printing system 100, the client 110 is installed with a printing utility 10 having the following functions.

  The print utility 10 installed in the client 110 has a device information addition function for adding device information such as double-sided printing, resolution, and finish option specified by the user to a print file specified by the user on the print utility screen. 11 and a copy-forgery-inhibited pattern print function 12 for designating printing of a copy-forgery-inhibited pattern.

  The print utility 10 performs processing according to the procedure (step S1 to step S8) shown in the flowchart of FIG.

  That is, in step S1, the print utility 10 first converts various device control information into a device control code of the image forming apparatus 120 and stores it as output data.

  In the next step S2, the screen state of the tint block printing option is checked to determine whether or not the tint block printing option is selected.

  If the determination result in step S2 is NO, that is, if the copy-forgery-inhibited pattern printing option is not selected, the process proceeds to step S6 and print data is set in the output data.

  If the determination result in step S2 is YES, that is, if the background pattern printing option is selected, it is determined in the next step S3 whether or not the use of silver toner is specified as the background pattern printing option. .

  If the determination result in step S3 is NO, that is, if the use of silver toner is not specified, the process proceeds to step S5, and the background pattern information specifying the normal background pattern addition printing process is set in the output data.

  If the determination result in step S3 is YES, that is, if the use of silver toner is not designated, the silver tint pattern is designated in step S4, and then the process proceeds to step S5 where silver toner is used. A copy-forgery-inhibited pattern information designating copy-forgery-inhibited pattern print processing is set in output data.

  In the next step S6, print data is set as output data.

  In the next step S7, the output data is sent to the image forming apparatus 120.

  When the image forming apparatus 120 receives the output data from the client 110, the image forming apparatus 120 executes print processing according to the procedure shown in the flowchart of FIG.

  That is, when the image forming apparatus 120 receives the output data from the client 110, first, in step S11, the image forming apparatus 120 determines whether or not the output data includes background pattern information, that is, whether or not background pattern printing is designated. judge.

  If the determination result in step S11 is NO, that is, if copy-forgery-inhibited pattern printing is not designated, the process proceeds to step 12 to perform a copy-forgery-inhibited print process for printing the print data included in the output data as it is.

  If the determination result in the above step S11 is YES, that is, if copy-forgery-inhibited pattern printing is specified, the process proceeds to step 13 to determine whether or not silver is specified for the copy-forgery-inhibited pattern, that is, use of silver toner is specified. It is determined whether or not.

  If the determination result in step S13 is NO, that is, if the use of silver toner is not specified, the process proceeds to step 14, and the normal background pattern addition for printing the print data included in the output data together with the black background pattern is performed. Execute print processing.

  If the determination result in step S13 is YES, that is, if the use of silver toner is specified, the process proceeds to step 15 to determine whether the character to be printed is a hollow character.

  If the decision result in this step S15 is YES, that is, if the character to be printed is a hollow character, the process proceeds to step 16 so that the silver toner is used for the character portion embedded in the background pattern and the white background portion. Enter the color information for silver.

  If the determination result in step S15 is NO, that is, if the character to be printed is not a hollow character, the process proceeds to step 17 where silver toner is used in the gap between the pattern portion of the background pattern and the character portion embedded in the background pattern. Enter the silver color information as shown.

  Then, in the next step 18, a tint block additional printing process using silver toner is executed.

  Here, in the normal tint block addition printing process, in the case of a hollow character, for example, as shown in FIG. 7A, a large black dot pattern array 31 is printed on the background portion, and a small portion is printed on the hollow character portion. A black dot pattern 32 is printed. If the character is not a hollow character, for example, as shown in FIG. 7B, a small black dot pattern pattern 33 is printed on the background portion, and a large black dot pattern 34 is printed on the character portion.

  On the other hand, in the copy-forgery-inhibited pattern addition printing process using silver toner, in the case of a hollow character, for example, as shown in FIG. 8A, a large black dot pattern row 41 and a small silver dot in the background portion. The pattern rows 42 are alternately printed, and a small silver dot pattern 43 is printed on the part of the hollow character. By using the silver toner in this way, it is possible to obtain a copy-forgery-inhibited pattern addition print result that can easily determine the white area rather than performing the white area with the density of the black toner. Further, when the character is not a hollow character, for example, as shown in FIG. 8B, a small silver dot pattern pattern 44 is printed on the background portion, and a large black dot pattern 45 and a small silver dot are printed on the character portion. A round dot pattern 46 is printed.

  As shown in FIG. 9, the image formed product subjected to the tint block additional printing process using silver toner is printed with characters normally raised when copied.

  In this way, by printing the tint block pattern using toner having a high reflectance such as silver, tint block printing can be performed without depending on the density of the tint block pattern. Also, copy-forgery-inhibited pattern printing can be performed without depending on individual performance differences and settings of the copying machine.

1 is a block diagram illustrating a printing system including an image forming apparatus and a client to which the present invention is applied. It is a block diagram which shows the hardware constitutions of the said client. FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating a hardware configuration of the image forming apparatus. The printing unit in the image forming apparatus is a diagram schematically showing a main configuration. It is a flowchart which shows the procedure of the printing process by the said printing utility. 5 is a flowchart illustrating a printing process procedure in the image forming apparatus. It is a figure which shows typically the example of a normal tint block addition printing process by the said image forming apparatus. FIG. 6 is a diagram schematically illustrating an example of a tint block addition printing process using high anti-slope toner by the image forming apparatus. It is a figure which shows typically the copy result of the image formation thing by the said image forming apparatus. FIG. 6 is a diagram schematically illustrating an example in which characters are normally raised and printed when an image formed product subjected to a copy-forgery-inhibited pattern printing process is copied. FIG. 10 is a diagram schematically illustrating an example in which characters are raised and are not printed when an image formation subjected to a tint block addition printing process is copied.

Explanation of symbols

10 Print utility,
11 Device information addition function,
12 Background pattern additional printing function,
100 printing system,
110 clients,
111 CPU,
112 ROM,
113 RAM,
114 hard disk,
115 display,
116 input section,
117 network interface,
118 bus,
120 image forming apparatus,
121 CPU,
122 ROM,
123 RAM,
124 operation panel,
125 printing section,
126 network interface,
127 bus,
130 network,
211, 221 main charging unit,
212, 222 Development section,
213, 223 photosensitive drum,
214, 224 Transfer part,
215,225 cleaning section,
216, 226 static elimination unit,
230 conveyor belt,

Claims (9)

An image forming apparatus having a copy-forgery-inhibited pattern embedding print function for embedding a copy-forgery-inhibited pattern in a document image to be prohibited from being copied,
Print processing means for printing a tint block pattern with high reflectance toner;
Control means for controlling the operation of the print processing means,
Based on the setting information, the control means determines whether or not the use of high reflectance toner is specified for the copy-forgery-inhibited pattern print when the copy-forgery-inhibited pattern print for embedding the copy-forgery-inhibited pattern is specified in the original image to be prohibited from being copied. If it is determined that the use of high-reflectance toner is specified, a background pattern is embedded in the original image to be prohibited from being copied, and the print processing means is controlled to print the background pattern with the high-reflectance toner. An image forming apparatus.   When the use of high reflectance toner is specified, the control means determines whether or not the character to be added to the copy-forgery-inhibited pattern is a hollow character, and if the character to be printed is a hollow character, 2. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1, wherein a high-reflectance toner is used for a character portion and a white portion embedded in the background pattern, and the background processing additional printing is performed by the print processing unit.   The control means determines whether or not the character to be printed with the copy-forgery-inhibited pattern is a hollow character when use of the high reflectance toner is specified. If the character to be printed is not the hollow character, the control pattern is determined. 2. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1, wherein a high-reflectance toner is used in a gap between the pattern portion and the character portion embedded in the background pattern, and the background processing additional printing is performed by the print processing unit. An image forming processing program for executing copy-forgery-inhibited pattern printing in which a copy-forgery-inhibited pattern is embedded in a manuscript image for which copying is prohibited.
Specify copy-forgery-inhibited pattern printing,
Specify the use of high-reflectance toner for the tint block additional printing
An image forming processing program for performing copy-forgery-inhibited pattern printing in which a copy-forgery-inhibited pattern is embedded in a document image to be prohibited from being copied, and the copy-forgery-inhibited pattern is printed with high-reflectance toner.   Judge whether the character to be printed with the tint block is a hollow character or not. If the character to be printed is a hollow character, use high-reflectance toner for the character part embedded in the ground pattern and the white part. 5. The image forming processing program according to claim 4, wherein the background pattern addition printing is performed.   It is determined whether or not the character to be printed with the tint block is a hollow character. If the character to be printed is not a hollow character, the high reflectance toner is placed in the space between the pattern portion of the tint block and the character portion embedded in the tint block. The image forming processing program according to claim 4, wherein a tint block additional printing is performed using.   An image formed product comprising a copy-forgery-inhibited pattern embedded with a high-reflectance toner such as silver in a manuscript image for which copying is prohibited.   The character embedded in the tint block printed with the tint block additional printing is a hollow character, and the tint block is additionally printed on the character part and the white part using a high reflectance toner. Image formation.   The character embedded in the background pattern printed with the above-mentioned background pattern is not a hollow character, and the background pattern is additionally printed using a high reflectance toner in the space between the pattern portion of the background pattern and the character portion embedded in the background pattern. 8. The image-formed product according to claim 7,

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