JP2814458B2 - Gravure plate making output device - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a gravure printing apparatus for producing a plate material for gravure printing.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art One of the methods for producing a printing plate for gravure printing involves engraving each halftone dot with a stylus (needle) such as diamond on the surface (plate surface) of a metal cylindrical plate material (cylinder). There is a sculpture method. In this method, the stylus of the engraving machine is two-dimensionally scanned with respect to the surface of the cylinder in the circumferential direction (main scanning direction) and the axial direction (sub-scanning direction) (actually, the cylinder is moved in the main scanning direction). While rotating, the stylus is pressed against the cylinder (while moving the stylus in the sub-scanning direction) to engrave a cell having a depth (volume) corresponding to each pixel of the image data.

As shown in FIG. 8A, when one printing plate 71 of gravure printing is composed of a plurality of block-shaped images 72, an operator transfers the image data of each block image 72 to one of the printing plates 71. A printing plate layout for determining whether to output (engraving) the portion is programmed in advance and stored in a gravure printing device. At the time of output (at the time of recording), the gravure output device reads the image data of each block image 72 from a disk device or the like, and then outputs the image data of the block image 72 to a location on the printing plate 71 designated by the program ( Sculpture). At the time of the printing plate layout, as shown in FIG. 8A, if there is a blank portion 74 that goes around the printing plate, the stylus will output the blank portion 74 at a speed higher than the normal scanning speed at the time of output. It can be programmed to move (in the sub-scan direction).

[0004]

In the engraving method, since a large number of image data are physically engraved one point at a time, an enormous amount of work time is required as compared with a plate making method in which a film is exposed by a light beam. Therefore, as described above,
There is a plan to reduce the working time by passing high-speed places where engraving is not necessary. However, when executing this measure, it is necessary for the operator to perform a troublesome operation of setting a skipped portion of the engraving head by a program in advance. If the allocation of a plurality of block images 72 is as shown in FIG. 8A, the above-described conventional method has a certain effect, but as shown in FIG.
In the case where there is no staggered arrangement and there is no blank portion that goes around the plate surface, such a time reduction method cannot be taken, and the entire surface must be scanned one point at a time.

The present invention has been made to solve such a problem, and an object of the present invention is to provide an image processing apparatus which can execute a printing operation according to the contents of image data constituting a printing plate without any troublesome operation. Another object of the present invention is to provide a gravure plate making output device capable of shortening the engraving time as much as possible.

[0006]

A gravure plate making output device according to the present invention, which has been made to solve the above problems, is shown in FIG.
As shown in FIG. 1, the engraving head 15 is moved in the axial direction of the plate material 14 in the sub-scanning direction while rotating the cylindrical plate material 14 in the circumferential direction in the main scanning direction.
A gravure plate making output device for forming a gravure plate by engraving a cell at each point with an engraving head 15; a) page data storage means 11 for storing image data corresponding to all plate surfaces of a plate material 14; In the image data stored in the page data storage means 11, the fact that the number of lines continuous in the main scanning direction is equal to or more than a predetermined number in the sub-scanning direction is blank , at least in engraving the corresponding portion.
A blank band detecting means for detecting in advance , c) engraving the cell with the engraving head 15 in the non-blank band portion and moving the engraving head 15 in the sub-scanning direction at a predetermined speed, and using the engraving head 15 in the blank band portion. Engraving control means 1 for moving engraving head 15 in the sub-scanning direction at a speed higher than a predetermined speed without performing cell engraving
3 is provided.

[0007]

The page data storage means 11 stores image data corresponding to the entire plate surface (the entire outer peripheral surface) of the plate material 14. The blank band detecting means 12 sequentially reads out the image data stored in the page data storage means 11 in the main scanning direction, and for each image data, a predetermined number of lines in the main scanning direction on the plate surface in the sub-scanning direction. Above consecutive blank portions are detected as blank bands. The engraving control unit 13 performs engraving of the cell by the engraving head 15 in a portion other than the blank band detected by the blank band detecting unit 12, and moves the engraving head 15 at a predetermined speed in the sub-scanning direction. But,
In the blank band portion, the cell is not engraved by the engraving head 15, and the engraving head 15 is moved in the sub-scanning direction at a speed higher than a predetermined speed. Thereby, the engraving time of the plate material 14 can be reduced.

[0008]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS A gravure plate making output apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to FIGS. As shown in FIG. 2, the gravure plate making output device of the present embodiment includes a gravure engraving machine 21 and an output processing device 22. In the present embodiment, as shown in FIG.
5. A work station mainly composed of a ROM 226 and a RAM 227 is used. Output processing device 22
In addition, a data input / output device 221 (for example, a magneto-optical disk drive) for inputting image data or the like from a medium on which image data is recorded, or outputting image data or the like to the medium, a display 222, a keyboard 223, a system disk device 224 such as a hard disk, and an image RAM 228 provided particularly for storing image data. These components are connected by a bus 229.

As shown in FIG. 2, the gravure engraving machine 21 has a main scanning motor 29 for rotating a cylinder 27, which is a plate material, and an engraving head 26 for engraving cells on the cylinder 27. Besides, an engraving machine driver 24, an engraving head driver 25,
An engraving machine controller 23 is provided. The engraving machine controller 23 also has a CPU 23 as shown in FIG.
3, ROM 234, RAM 235, display 231
And a keyboard 232, and the engraving machine driver 2
4 and the engraving head driver 25 are connected by a bus 236. The bus 229 of the output processing device 22 and the bus 236 of the engraving machine controller 23 are connected via an interface (not shown).

The cylinder 27 is sandwiched between a driving rotation shaft of the main scanning motor 29 and a free rotation shaft of the cylinder fixing device 33, and is held at a predetermined position. The engraving head 26 is provided so as to be movable on a ball screw 30 provided in parallel with the rotation axis of the cylinder 27. The engraving head 2 is rotated by rotating the ball screw 30 by the sub-scanning motor 28.
6 moves parallel to the rotation axis of the cylinder 27 (that is, in the sub-scanning direction). The main scanning motor 29 and the sub-scanning motor 28 are provided with rotary encoders 32 and 31, respectively.
Thus, the position 6 can be detected.

The engraving head 26 has a stylus (needle) 36 for engraving cells on the cylinder 27, a vibrating part 37 for vibrating the stylus 36, and a distance between the vibrating part 37 and the surface of the cylinder 27. There is provided a moving unit 38 for performing the movement. When engraving a cell in the cylinder 27, the stylus 36 is always vibrated at high speed by the vibrating section 37 utilizing a resonance mechanism, and the vibrating section 37 is moved by the moving section 38.
The cell of an arbitrary depth is engraved on the surface of the cylinder 27 by moving the cylinder closer to or away from the cylinder 27. Then, the cylinder 27 is rotated in the main scanning direction by the main scanning motor 29, and the engraving head 26 is moved in the sub scanning direction by the sub-scanning motor 28, so that a two-dimensional image is formed on the surface (plate surface) of the cylinder 27 as a plate material. Is engraved on each cell constituting.

Next, the operation of the gravure printing apparatus of the present embodiment for producing a gravure plate of the original 50 shown in FIG. 6A will be described. The document 50 in FIG. 6A has a design area 51 such as a photograph on the left, a character area 52 on the upper right, and a design area 53 on the lower right.
4, and the left and right side edges 55 and 56 have no data to be printed. In the conventional gravure plate making output device, in the case of such an original 50, an operator creates a program in advance and engraves the engraving head in those portions 54, 55, and 56 (hereinafter, these portions are collectively referred to as blank portions). 26 was moved at high speed. However, in the gravure plate making output device of the present embodiment, the engraving head 26 is automatically moved at high speed in the blank portions 54, 55, 56 as follows.

As shown in the flowchart of FIG. 5, first, in the output processing device 22, the image data of the document is read from the medium by the data input / output device 221 and stored in the image RAM 228 (step S).
1). Next, a variable (line number) y indicating the number of the main scanning line is initialized to 0 (step S2), and a variable (blank line counter) c for counting the number of continuous blank lines (described later) is set to 0.
(Step S3). Then, the image data of the main scanning line with the line number y is read from the image memory (step S4), and the value d of the image data of each pixel constituting the line is compared with a predetermined engraving lower limit value d0 (step S4).
5). Here, the engraving lower limit value d0 is a limit value for not engraving the cell corresponding to the image data when the value of the image data is less than this value. Become. As a result of the comparison in step S5, if all the values d of the image data constituting the main scanning line are less than d0, the process proceeds from step S6 to step S8, and the value of the blank line counter c is incremented by one. The main scanning line in which the image data values of all the pixels are less than d0 is called a blank line. In addition, instead of individually comparing the image data of each pixel with the engraving lower limit value d0, the image data of all the pixels constituting the main scanning line is summed, and the sum is compared with a predetermined engraving lower limit value. Thus, a blank line may be detected.

Next, it is determined whether or not the line number y has exceeded the total number N of main scanning lines constituting the image data stored in the image memory (step S14). y is incremented by 1 (step S
7) Thereafter, the flow returns to step S4, and the image data of the next main scanning line is read from the image memory. The region 54 in FIG.
In the part where many blank lines continue like 55 and 56,
The loop of steps S4 to S14 is repeated, during which the value of the blank line counter c increases.

In step S6, if at least one of the image data constituting the main scanning line has an engraving lower limit value d0 or more, the process proceeds to step S9 and subsequent steps. Here, first, it is determined whether or not the value of the blank line counter c is equal to or larger than a predetermined skip limit value c0. If c ≧ c0, the process proceeds to step S10 to create engraving data of the main scanning line y, and then, in step S11, creates skip data of the main scanning lines of line numbers yc to y-1. The skip data is the number of two main scanning lines (for example, yj ← y−
c and y k ← y−1). As will be described later, between these main scanning lines, the stylus 36 is separated from the cylinder 27, and the engraving head 26 moves faster than the normal moving speed in the sub scanning direction. It is moved by. The part where the skip data is created is called a blank band. In FIG. 6A, blank portions 54, 55 and 56 at both ends and the center are blank bands. If it is determined in step S9 that the value of the blank line counter c has not reached the predetermined number c0 (naturally, the case where c = 0 is also included), skip data is not created and the blank line ( Engraving data (representing the depth or volume of the cell engraved on the cylinder 27) corresponding to the image data of each pixel constituting the current main scanning line y and the main scanning lines from line numbers yc to y-1). Is created (step S12).

In steps S9 and S12, skip data is not created unless the number of blank lines is equal to or greater than the predetermined number c0. Even if the number of blank lines is small, skipping is performed even if the number of blank lines is continuous. This is because the effect of shortening the time is small, and conversely, if a special process different from the normal process is inserted, a greater load may be generated on the machine side.

In this way, when at least one non-blank main scanning line is present and the process proceeds from step S6 to step S9, the value of the blank line counter c is cleared to 0 (step S1).
3). Thereafter, the process proceeds to step S14, and after it is determined whether or not the line number y has reached the total number N similarly to the above,
If not, the process returns from step S7 to S4. If the line number y has reached the total number N in step S14, the processing in FIG. 5 ends.

By the above processing, as shown in FIG. 6B, the main scanning line (and the continuous scanning line) where the point to be engraved exists is obtained from the image data of the image of the original as shown in FIG. A set of engraving data (engraving data file) 57 consisting only of a set of blank lines whose number is equal to or less than a predetermined number c0
And a set of skip data (skip data file) 58 corresponding to the blank band. These engraving data file 57 and skip data file 58
The information may be temporarily recorded on a medium or may be sent directly to the gravure engraving machine 21. Compared with the engraving speed of the gravure engraving machine 21, the speed of creating the engraving data file 57 and the skip data file 58 is much faster, so that the engraving by the gravure engraving machine 21 is immediately performed when these data files are created. It is also possible to start.

The gravure engraving machine 2 receiving the engraving data file 57 and the skip data file 58
First, the first engraving machine controller 23 refers to the skip data file 58 and stores an area to be skipped and an area not to be skipped. Then, after engraving is started from the first main scanning line, engraving data is read from the engraving data file 57 in an area that should not be skipped,
While engraving a cell having a depth corresponding to each value, the engraving head 26 is moved in the sub-scanning direction at a predetermined speed. When entering the area to be skipped (blank band), the engraving machine driver 24 moves the stylus 36 away from the cylinder 27 and rotates the sub-scanning motor 28 at high speed to move the engraving head 26 to the last main scanning line in the skip area. Move to the position at high speed. This shortens the engraving time.

As described above, in the gravure prepress output device of the present embodiment, the output processing device 22 reads the image data of the original, automatically detects blank bands composed of a predetermined number or more of blank lines, and skips the data. Create Therefore, there is no need for the operator to create a program for skipping the engraving head 26. Further, the output processing device 22 includes:
In order to determine whether all the image data inside the document is blank or not, for example, as shown in FIG. 7A, in each block image 72, the image data 73 to be engraved actually corresponds to the block image 72. When there is only a part, the blank band 74 can be wider than in the conventional case (FIG. 8A), and the engraving time can be further shortened. In addition, since the block images 75 are arranged in a staggered manner, even in the case where the engraving head 26 cannot be skipped in the related art (FIG. 8B), similarly, as shown in FIG. When the image data 76 to be engraved in the image 75 actually exists only in a part of the block image 75 and the blank band 77 exists, the engraving head 26 can be skipped, and the engraving time can be reduced. It becomes possible.

In the embodiment described above, the image RAM 228, which is an image memory, serves as the page data storage means of the present invention, the output processing device 22 for performing the processing from step S4 to S13 serves as the blank band detecting means, and The engraving machine controller 23 corresponds to engraving control means.

[0022]

In the gravure plate making output device according to the present invention, there is no need to engrave cells (blank band portions).
In this case, the cell is not engraved, and the engraving head is moved in the sub-scanning direction at a speed higher than the normal moving speed, so that the engraving time can be reduced as compared with the conventional case. In addition, since such a blank band is automatically detected by the present gravure plate making output device, there is no need for the operator to set a skipped portion of the engraving head by a program in advance as in a conventional device. Becomes Furthermore, in the conventional apparatus, only the presence / absence of a blank portion is determined based on the size of the outer shape of the material image, but in the gravure plate making output device according to the present invention, the contents of the material image are stepped down. Since the presence or absence of a blank band is determined, the engraving time can be reduced to the maximum.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a schematic configuration of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a gravure platemaking output device according to one embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing a configuration of an output processing device of the gravure plate making output device of the embodiment.

FIG. 4 is a block diagram showing a configuration of an engraving machine controller of the gravure plate making output device of the embodiment.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart of a process performed by an output processing device of the gravure plate making output device of the embodiment.

6A is a plan view of a document used in the embodiment, and FIG.
FIG. 3 is an explanatory diagram showing a configuration of a data file (engraving data file and skip data file) created from the document.

FIG. 7 is an explanatory diagram showing an engraved portion and a skipped portion when engraving is performed by the gravure plate making output device of the embodiment when the block images are arranged in the arrangement arrangement (a) and the staggered arrangement (b).

FIG. 8 is a plan view of an original in which block images are arranged in an arrangement (a) and a staggered arrangement (b).

[Explanation of symbols]

11 page data storage means 12 blank band detecting means 13 engraving control means 14 plate material 15 engraving head 21 gravure engraving machine 22 output processing device 23 engraving machine controller 24 engraving machine driver 25 engraving head driver 26 engraving head 27 cylinder 28 sub-scanning motor 29 main scanning motor 50 original 51, 53 design area 52 character area 54, 55, 5
6 Blank area 57 Engraving data file 58 Skip data file 71 Plate 72, 75 Block image 73, 76 Image data 74, 77 Blank band

──────────────────────────────────────────────────続 き Continuation of the front page (72) Inventor Tsukasa Okai 4-chome Ten-jin, Horikawa-dori Teranouchi, Kamigyo-ku, Kyoto 1 Daikoku Screen Manufacturing Co., Ltd. (56) References JP-A-4 JP-A-138253 (JP, A) JP-A-56-105962 (JP, A) JP-A-59-156779 (JP, A) JP-A-56-164 (JP, A) (58) Fields surveyed (Int. Cl. ⁶ , DB name) B41C 1/00-1/18 B41J 19/18

Claims (1)

(57) [Claims] 1. An engraving head is moved in an axial direction of a plate material, which is a sub-scanning direction, while rotating a cylindrical plate material in a circumferential direction, which is a main scanning direction, while engraving a cell with an engraving head at each point. A gravure prepress output device for producing a gravure plate by performing: a) a page data storage means for storing image data corresponding to all plate surfaces of the plate material; and b) a page data storage means for storing the image data stored in the page data storage means. The fact that a predetermined number or more of lines in the main scanning direction are continuous in the sub-scanning direction and that there are no blanks , at least before engraving the corresponding portion.
A blank zone detecting means for detecting standing, c) in the portion not blank zone is moved in the sub-scanning direction engraving head at a predetermined speed and performs the engraving of cells in engraving head, engraving of the cells by the engraving head a blank band portion Engraving control means for moving the engraving head in the sub-scanning direction at a speed higher than a predetermined speed without performing the engraving operation.