JP3152962B2 - Image forming device - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus using an electron-emitting device.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, a plurality of electron-emitting devices developed in a plane and an image-forming member (for example, a phosphor, a resist material, etc., for forming an image by irradiating an electron beam emitted from the electron-emitting device). Light emission, discoloration,
2. Description of the Related Art Thin image forming apparatuses in which a member (e.g., a member that is charged or deteriorated) faces each other are known.

FIG. 7 shows an example of such an image forming apparatus.
1 shows a schematic configuration diagram of a conventional electron beam display device. This device is an electron beam display device having a configuration in which a modulation electrode is disposed between opposing electron-emitting devices and an image forming member. In the figure, reference numeral 91 denotes a rear plate. Reference numeral 92 denotes a support, 93 denotes a wiring electrode, and 94 denotes an electron-emitting portion. These form an electron-emitting device.
Reference numeral 96 denotes a modulation electrode, and 95 denotes an electron passage hole provided in the modulation electrode 96. 97 is a glass plate, 98 is a transparent electrode, 99
Denotes a phosphor (image forming member), and the face plate 100 is formed by these. 101 is a luminescent spot of the phosphor. The electron emitting portion 94 is formed by a thin film technique and has a hollow structure that does not contact the rear plate 91. The modulation electrode 96 is arranged in a space above the electron emission unit 94 (in the electron emission direction), and the electron beam emitted from the electron emission unit 94 passes through the electron passage hole 95.

In this configuration, a thermoelectron is emitted by applying a voltage to the wiring electrode 93 to heat the electron emitting portion 94. The emitted electrons are taken out through the electron passage holes 95 and accelerated by applying a voltage to a modulation electrode 96 that modulates the electron flow according to an information signal.
The light collides with the phosphor 99 to generate a luminescent spot 101. An XY matrix is formed by the wiring electrode 93 and the modulation electrode 96, and by applying a predetermined signal to these electrodes,
An image is displayed on the phosphor 99 as an image forming unit.

[0005]

However, in this conventional image forming apparatus, an image forming member (phosphor) is used.
Are disposed in the space above the electron-emitting device (in the electron-emitting direction) so as to face the electron-emitting device, and thus have the following problems.

First, when an electron beam is irradiated to the residual gas in the image forming member or the apparatus, positive ions are generated, and the positive ions are generated in a direction opposite to the electron acceleration direction by a high voltage for accelerating the electrons. There is a problem that it is accelerated and collides with the electron-emitting device, causing damage to the electron-emitting device. Such damage is particularly remarkable when the apparatus is driven under the condition that the degree of vacuum in the apparatus is 10 ^-5 torr or less. Even if the inside of the apparatus is maintained at a high degree of vacuum, the apparatus is continuously driven for a long time. Causes similar damage. Such damage to the electron-emitting device eventually leads to a reduction in the amount of electron emission (electron emission efficiency) or, in the worst case, device destruction, causing uneven brightness and brightness fluctuation of the phosphor, resulting in an image formed. The contrast will be reduced.

Second, since it is difficult to precisely align the image forming member (phosphor) and the electron-emitting portion in the lateral direction, a slight displacement occurs, which causes a significant reduction in contrast, that is, a decrease in fluorescent light, in a formed image. There is a problem that brightness unevenness and brightness fluctuation of an image occur.

Third, it is difficult to keep the distance between the image forming member (phosphor) and the electron-emitting portion of the electron-emitting device constant. As a result, the distance fluctuates due to impact, thermal distortion during driving, and the like. This causes a problem that the contrast of the formed image is unintentionally reduced, that is, the luminance unevenness or the luminance fluctuation of the fluorescent image is caused.

In particular, the second and third problems are that R (red), G (green) and B (blue)
In an image forming apparatus having an image forming member on which a multicolor phosphor is arranged, color unevenness is caused and color reproducibility corresponding to an information signal is reduced. SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is an object of the present invention to provide a high-contrast and clear image for a long time in an image forming apparatus. Another object is to enable an image forming apparatus for forming a full-color image to form an image with less color tone unevenness and excellent color reproducibility. Still another object is to make it possible to easily manufacture an image forming apparatus without requiring strict alignment between an image forming member and an electron-emitting portion of an electron-emitting device.

[0010]

Means for Solving the Problems] The image forming apparatus of the present invention for achieving the above object, includes an electron emission element, a light-emitting element, and a voltage applying means for applying a predetermined voltage to the luminous body
A image forming apparatus, the electron emission device emits an electron beam, one electron-emitting device in response to the predetermined voltage applied a set of multiple light emitters them by the electron beam emission It is intended to be, before the light emitter is marked pressurized
Are those resulting in emission pattern of the image corresponding to the serial voltage and the electron-emitting element and the light emitter are juxtaposed on the same substrate <br/>, and said voltage applying means in a set A voltage is applied independently to each illuminant.
In the set of plural light emitters, the corresponding electron emission
The higher the distance from the electron-emitting portion of the device to the light emitter, the higher
A high voltage is applied to the luminous body .

[0011]

In a preferred aspect, the voltage applying means has a modulating means for modulating an information signal having information of a formed image to generate a voltage to be applied.

As the electron-emitting device, any of a hot cathode and a cold cathode may be used as long as it has been conventionally used as an electron source of an image forming apparatus. It is not preferable because the electron emission efficiency and the response speed are reduced due to thermal diffusion, and the hot cathode and the image forming member cannot be arranged at a high density because the image forming member may be deteriorated due to heat. Therefore, a cold cathode type device such as a surface conduction electron-emitting device and a semiconductor electron-emitting device is preferable. Among them, the surface conduction electron-emitting device has the following advantages in the image forming apparatus of the present invention: 1) high electron emission efficiency can be obtained; 2) the device structure of the present invention is possible because of its simple structure. It is particularly preferable because it has the advantages of being easy to perform, 3) being able to form a large number of elements on the same substrate, 4) having a high response speed, and 5) having even better luminance contrast.

Here, the surface conduction element is, for example, a cold cathode element [Radio Engineering Electron Physics (Radio Eng.), Published by MI Elinson and others.
Electron. Phys. ) Volume 10, 1290-
1296, 1965], which applies a voltage between the electrodes (device electrodes) to a small-area thin film (electron-emitting portion) formed between the electrodes (device electrodes) provided on the base surface. A device that emits electrons by passing a current in parallel to the film surface, and uses an SnO ₂ (Sb) thin film developed by Elinson et al., As well as an Au thin film [G. "Sin Solid Films" (G. Dittmer: "Thin Sol
id Films "), 9, 317, (1972).
Year)], using ITO thin film [M. Hartwell
And CJ Fonstad "I E
"E.E.Trans.E.D.Conf" (M.
Hartwell and C.I. G. FIG. Fonstad:
"IEEE Trans. ED Conf.") 519
, (1975)], using a carbon thin film [Hisashi Araki et al .: "Vacuum", Vol. 26, No. 1, p. 22, (1983)
Year)]. In addition to the above, as described later, the electron emission portion may be formed by dispersion of metal fine particles. In a preferred embodiment, the thin film (electron emitting portion) has a sheet resistance of 10 ³ Ω / □ to 1
0 ⁹ Ω / □, and the electrode spacing is 0.01 μm
１００100 μm.

Another advantage of using a surface conduction electron-emitting device as an electron-emitting device is that, in a surface conduction electron-emitting device, electrons emitted from an electron-emitting portion formed between electrodes are applied when a voltage is applied. The electron beam trajectory is largely deflected to the positive electrode side with respect to the vertical direction because the electron beam flies to the positive electrode side with the velocity component. That is, the use of an electron-emitting device having a large degree of deflection of the electron beam orbit in the horizontal direction is based on the fact that the electron-emitting device and the image forming member are arranged side by side on the substrate surface. This is a particularly preferred embodiment.

The image forming member is, for example, a luminous body that emits light when irradiated with an electron beam. When a full-color luminous image is formed, light of three primary colors of R (red), G (green) and B (blue) is emitted. The body is used as a set. Usually, a plurality of electron-emitting devices and a plurality of corresponding image forming members are arranged in a matrix on the substrate surface.

When the luminous body is used as an image forming member, the luminous body may further include a recording medium on which an image is recorded by irradiating light from the luminous body, and a support means for the recording medium.

A plurality of electron-emitting devices and a plurality of sets of luminous bodies corresponding to the plurality of electron-emitting devices are arranged in a matrix so as to correspond to each other. The elements are connected, and the light emitters are connected for each column.

Further, in the case of recording an image, for example, a recording medium on which an image is recorded by irradiation of light from a luminous body, and a supporting means for the recording medium are provided.

[0020]

In this configuration, when the electron-emitting device is driven, for example, by applying a predetermined voltage between its positive and negative electrodes, electrons are emitted from the electron-emitting device. Thereafter, acceleration is performed in accordance with the voltage applied to each of the corresponding sets of light emitters separately and independently, reaches the light emitters, and, depending on the voltage, collides with the light emitters and causes the light emitters to emit light, or They do not emit light without colliding. As described above, the electron beam is selectively turned on / off in accordance with the fluctuation in the potential of each light emitter, and an image is formed in accordance with the ON / OFF control.

At this time, the flight direction of the emitted electrons is deflected toward the luminous body. However, since the mass of the positive ions generated by the emitted electrons is much larger than that of the electrons, the trajectory is hardly bent. Therefore, the positive ions do not collide with the electron-emitting device and hardly damage the electron-emitting device.

With regard to one set of light emitting elements, the light emitting elements located farther from the corresponding electron-emitting device are sufficiently irradiated with the emitted electrons while being supplemented by other electrodes or insulating layers in their orbits. Therefore, it is advantageous to apply a higher voltage to the luminous body as the distance from the electron-emitting device to the luminous body increases. Further, one set of light emitters is
In the case where the light-emitting elements are composed of the light-emitting elements of the primary colors, the luminous efficiency of each light-emitting element may be different depending on the color. Therefore, it is effective to set the applied voltage of each light-emitting element in consideration of this.

For example, among the phosphors of the three primary colors, the phosphor of green (Green) generally has high luminous efficiency, but the phosphor of blue (Bl)
ue) phosphor is low. Therefore, the green phosphor is arranged at the closest position of the electron-emitting device, the blue phosphor is arranged at the far position, the green phosphor emits light at a relatively low applied voltage, and the blue phosphor is As in the case of applying a relatively high voltage, the difference in luminous efficiency between the phosphors can be compensated for by the difference in the applied voltage to achieve balance. That is, particularly when a color image is formed, by utilizing the difference in luminous efficiency of the phosphors and applying different voltages to the respective phosphors, the color balance (R, G, B emission ratio for obtaining a reference white) is obtained. Is easily set.

On the other hand, when manufacturing the device, the luminous body and the electron-emitting device are arranged side by side on the substrate, so that the luminous body and the electron-emitting device are formed on the same substrate by a printing method or the like. Strict alignment between the electron-emitting device and the luminous body is not required, and the luminous body is extremely easily arranged. Further, after the device is manufactured, there is no change in the positional relationship between the electron-emitting device and the light-emitting body. Therefore, high-contrast, clear and high-definition images are maintained for a long time,
In particular, in a full-color image forming apparatus, an image with less color tone unevenness and excellent color reproducibility is formed, and the apparatus can be easily manufactured and thinned.

Since an electron beam from one electron-emitting device is irradiated to a set of a plurality of phosphors, there is no need to form an electron-emitting device between the phosphors, and furthermore, there is no need for a pixel. High density is achieved. Especially for color, R,
Since the pixels are composed of the phosphors of the three primary colors G and B, and further higher density is required, the configuration of the present invention is advantageous.

[0026]

【Example】Example 1  FIG. 1 is a perspective view of an image forming apparatus according to a first embodiment of the present invention.
FIG. 2 is an enlarged perspective view of a part thereof, and FIG.
3 is a sectional view taken along line AA ′ of FIG. As shown in these figures,
The device of the first embodiment includes an electron-emitting device 10, a phosphor 16 (16r, 1).
6g, 16b) and applying a predetermined voltage to the phosphor 16
(Not shown). Electron-emitting device 10
Emits an electron beam, and one electron-emitting device 10
A set of the plurality of phosphors 16r, 16g, 16b is
They emit light in accordance with the voltage applied to them.
Thus, the fluorescent substance 16 is thereby provided with an image corresponding to the applied voltage.
Light-emitting pattern.
The element 10 and the phosphor 16 are provided on the surface of the insulating substrate 12.
And a voltage applying means is provided for each phosphor 16 in the set.
The voltage is applied separately and independently.

The electron-emitting device 10 has opposing positive and negative device electrodes 14a and 14b, and emits electrons when a voltage is applied between these electrodes.

There are a plurality of pairs of the electron-emitting devices 10 and the corresponding phosphors 16, and the positive and negative electrodes 14a and 14b of each electron-emitting device 10 are connected by device wiring electrodes 13a and 13b, respectively. . Each electron-emitting device 10 connected by one device wiring electrode 13a and 13b forms one electron-emitting device row that is driven simultaneously. Further, for each row in the direction <br/> the element array and the Cartesian, each phosphor 16, the phosphor wiring electrodes 2
Connected by 0. Therefore, the element wiring electrodes 13a and 13b and the phosphor wiring electrode 20 each have a plurality of columns, and are arranged in a matrix so that the plurality of columns intersect. Element wiring electrode 13
Electrical insulation is maintained by the insulator 22 between the a and 13b and the phosphor wiring electrode 20. Further, the face plate 19 is
It is supported by the support frame 17.

The electron-emitting device 10 has an electron-emitting portion 15 between the electrodes 14a and 14b, and emits electrons from the electron-emitting portion 15 by applying a voltage between these electrodes. Type surface conduction electron-emitting device.

Next, a method of manufacturing the device will be described.
First, the insulating substrate 12 is sufficiently washed, and the device electrodes 14a and 14b and the device electrodes 14a and 1
For each set 4b, three phosphor wiring electrodes 20 are made of a material containing Ni as a main component. The phosphor wiring electrode 20 may be manufactured using a material other than Ni as long as it is manufactured so that the electric resistance is sufficiently low.

Next, 3 μm of SiO ₂ is formed by a vapor deposition technique.
Of the insulating layer 22 having a thickness of This insulating layer 22 may be formed using glass or another ceramic material.

Next, the element wiring electrodes 13a and 13b are made of a Ni material by a vapor deposition technique and an etching technique.
At this time, the device electrodes 14a and 14b are connected by the device wiring electrodes 13a and 13b so that the device electrodes 14a and 14b form the electron emission portion 15 facing each other. The electrode gap G between the device electrodes 14a and 14b is preferably 0.1 to 10 μm, and is formed to 2 μm here. The length L (see FIG. 2) of the facing portion corresponding to the electron-emitting portion 15 is formed to be 300 μm. It is desirable that the width W1 (see FIG. 3) of the device electrodes 14a and 14b is narrow, but in practice, it is preferably 1 to 100 μm, and more preferably 1 to 10 μm. Also, the electron emitting portion 15
Are formed near the center between two adjacent pairs of phosphor wiring electrodes 20. The arrangement pitch of each set of the element wiring electrodes 13a and 13b is 1 mm, and the arrangement pitch of the electron emission portions 15 in the direction parallel to the element wiring electrodes is 1.5.
mm.

Next, an electron emission portion 15 is formed by providing an ultrafine particle film between the opposing device electrodes 14a and 14b by using a gas deposition method. Although Pd is used as the material of the ultrafine particles, other materials such as metal materials such as Ag and Au and oxide materials such as SnO ₂ and In ₂ O ₃ are preferable, but not limited thereto. In this embodiment, the diameter of the Pd particles is set to about 100 °, but the present invention is not limited to this. In addition to the gas deposition method, desired characteristics can be obtained even if an ultrafine particle film is formed between electrodes by, for example, dispersing and coating an organic metal and then performing heat treatment.

Next, the green, red and blue phosphors 16g, 1
Each phosphor is placed in the order of 6r and 16b,
It is formed on the phosphor wiring electrode 20 with a thickness of 0 μm. The phosphor 16 may be formed by other methods such as a slurry method and a precipitation method.

Then, the face plate 19 is disposed on the insulating substrate 12 on which the electron-emitting devices and the like are formed, via the support frame 17 having a thickness of 5 mm. Between and insulating substrate 1
Frit glass is applied between the support frame 2 and the support frame 17, and 43
By sintering at 0 ° C. for 10 minutes or more, these are bonded to each other.

The atmosphere in the apparatus in the glass container thus completed is evacuated by a vacuum pump to a sufficient degree of vacuum. Then, a current is applied between the device electrodes, and finally the glass container is sealed. The degree of vacuum at this time is 10 ⁻⁶ to 10 ⁻⁷ torr, which is sufficient for obtaining a more stable operation of the apparatus.
r.

Next, a method of driving the apparatus will be described.
FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram showing this driving method. As shown in the figure, a pair of element wiring electrodes 1 are driven by an element driving circuit 41.
When a voltage pulse of 14V is applied to 3a, 13b, electrons are emitted from each electron emitting portion 15 of the element row connected to the voltage pulse. The emitted electron beams respectively fly toward the element electrode 14a on the positive electrode side.
Thereafter, ON / OFF control is performed by a ground potential or a positive voltage applied to the phosphors 16g, 16r, and 16b on the element electrode 14a side independently in response to the information signal via the phosphor wiring electrode 20. The voltage at the time of beam ON is 80 V for 16 g of the green phosphor and 1 for the red phosphor.
The voltage for 6r is 100V, and the voltage for blue phosphor 16b is 150V. These voltages are generated in the phosphor driving circuit 43 based on the information signal and applied to each phosphor wiring electrode. As a result, the electron beam from the corresponding electron-emitting device accelerates and collides with the phosphor to which the voltage at the time of beam ON is applied, causing it to emit light, thereby displaying an image of one line. . The applied voltage is a value determined by the type of the phosphor used and the required luminance, and is not limited to the above range.

In this manner, the pair of element wiring electrodes 13
1 corresponding to the information signal by the phosphor corresponding to a and 13b
When the display of the line is completed, a pair of adjacent element wiring electrodes 13a and 13b is selected, a voltage pulse of 14V is applied, and the display of the next one line is performed in the same manner. By sequentially performing this, an image of one screen is formed. That is, the element wiring electrodes 13a, 13b
Are used as scanning electrodes, and an XY matrix is formed by the scanning electrodes and each set (trio) of phosphor wiring electrodes 20 corresponding to each set of R, G, B phosphors 16g, 16r, 16b, and an image is displayed. .

According to this, since the electron-emitting device 15 is of a surface conduction type and can be driven in response to a voltage pulse of 100 picoseconds or less, an image for one screen is displayed in 1/30 second. For example, 10,000 or more scanning lines can be formed.
Further, since the electron beam is converged by the voltage applied to the phosphor 16 in the lateral direction on the same substrate as the electron-emitting device, the electron-emitting device is not destroyed by ion bombardment and does not generate uneven brightness. Image display is performed.
That is, when a surface conduction electron-emitting device is used, electrons having an initial velocity of several volts are emitted into a vacuum therefrom, and such an electron beam modulation is extremely effectively performed.

In the manufacture of the device, alignment between the electron-emitting device 15 and the phosphor 16 is easy, and
Since a thin film manufacturing technique can be used, a large screen and high definition display can be obtained at low cost. In addition, since the distance between the electron-emitting portion 15 and the phosphor 16 can be formed with extremely high precision, an extremely uniform image display device having no uneven brightness can be obtained. Further, by forming the device electrodes 14a and 14b together with the phosphor 16 by a printing method, alignment can be further facilitated.

In particular, since a plurality of phosphors are irradiated by an electron beam emitted from one electron-emitting device, pixels can be formed at a higher density.

Embodiment 2 FIG. 5 is a schematic structural view of an optical printer according to a second embodiment of the present invention. This device includes a light emitting source 48, a lens array 49, and a recording medium 45. Lens array 4
Numeral 9 is generally formed by a selfoc lens, is disposed between the light emitting source 48 and the recording medium 45, and forms a bright spot generated on the phosphor 16 of the light emitting source 48 on the recording medium 45. Is what you do.

The light emitting source 48 is the same as the one-dimensional light emitting source of the image forming apparatus of the first embodiment described above, which has only one pair of the element wiring electrodes 13a and 13b and therefore has only one electron emitting element array. And manufactured similarly. Then, a vacuum container is formed by the face plate 19, the rear plate (insulating base) 32 and the support frame 17. In addition, since one electron-emitting device corresponds to three phosphors, the driving method and driving voltage of the phosphor are different from those of the first embodiment except that the phosphors are arranged one-dimensionally.
Is the same as However, here, the phosphor 16 is of a single color.

In the figure, reference numeral 23 denotes an outer container electrode for applying a voltage to the element wiring electrode 13a of the element electrode 14a on the positive electrode side;
Reference numeral 24 denotes an outer container electrode for applying a voltage to the element wiring electrode 13b of the negative electrode element electrode 14b, and reference numeral 25 denotes an outer container electrode for applying a voltage to the phosphor wiring electrode 20.

The recording medium 45 is produced by uniformly applying the photosensitive composition to a polyethylene terephthalate film with a thickness of 2 μm. The photosensitive composition comprises: a. Ba
Lee Nda: polyethylene methacrylate (trade name: DIANAL BR, Mitsubishi Rayon) 10 parts by weight, b. Monomer: 10 parts by weight of trimethylolpropane triacrylate (trade name: TMPTA, Shin-Nakamura Chemical), c. Polymerization initiator: 2-methyl-2-morpholino (4-thiomethylphenyl) propane-1-xy (trade name; Irgacure 9)
07, Ciba-Geigy) and 2.2 parts by weight, and is prepared using 70 parts by weight of methyl ethyl ketone as a solvent. The phosphor is a silicate phosphor (Ba, Mg,
Zn) ₃ Si ₂ O ₇ : Pb ²⁺ is the main material.

In this configuration, when a desired light emitting pattern is formed, first, a voltage pulse of 14 V is applied between the device electrodes 14 a and 14 b via the outer electrodes 23 and 24, and electrons are emitted from each electron-emitting device 10. Release.
Next, a voltage is applied to each phosphor 16 via the external electrode 25. This voltage is a voltage whose application time and ON / OFF are controlled by the information signal, and the light emission time and the light emission pattern are controlled according to the information signal.
Thereby, a light emission pattern for one line of the image is formed on the phosphor. The light beam of this light emission pattern illuminates the recording medium 45 via the lens array 49. Thereby, the recording medium 45 is cured by photopolymerization in accordance with the light emission pattern, thereby forming an image for one line.

Next, relative movement of one line between the light emitting source 48 and the recording medium 45 is performed, and image formation of the next one line is performed in the same manner. Then, a desired image can be formed on the recording medium 45 by sequentially repeating this.

The relative movement between the light emitting source 48 and the recording medium 45 synchronized with the image forming timing for one line is shown in FIG.
As shown in FIG. 7, the recording is performed by driving the transport roller 53 while supporting the recording medium 45 with the support 52.

By developing the photopolymerization pattern thus formed on the recording medium 45 with methyl ethyl ketone, an optical recording pattern corresponding to the information signal is formed on the polyethylene terephthalate.

According to this, a uniform, high-speed, high-contrast, clear optical recording pattern can be obtained. Further, since a plurality of phosphors are irradiated with electrons from one electron-emitting device, a higher-definition image can be obtained as described above.

[0051]

As described above, according to the present invention, since the electron-emitting device and the phosphor are arranged side by side on the substrate, damage and deterioration of the electron-emitting device due to the collision of positive ions can be prevented. In addition, when manufacturing the device, the phosphor can be extremely easily aligned with the electron-emitting device, and the device can be thinned. Further, after the device is manufactured, there is no change in the positional relationship between the electron-emitting device and the phosphor. Therefore, a high-contrast, clear and high-definition image can be maintained over a long period of time, so that the device can be easily manufactured and reduced in size even in the case of color.

Further, since the electron beam from one electron-emitting device is irradiated to a set of a plurality of phosphors, it is not necessary to form an electron-emitting device between each phosphor, and furthermore, an image can be displayed. High definition can be achieved. In particular, in the case of color, pixels are composed of phosphors of three primary colors of R, G, and B,
Since further densification is required, the configuration of the present invention is advantageous.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of an image forming apparatus according to a first embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an enlarged perspective view of the vicinity of one electron-emitting device in FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is a sectional view taken along line AA ′ of FIG. 2;

FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram showing a driving method of the device of FIG. 1;

FIG. 5 is a schematic diagram illustrating a schematic configuration of an optical printer according to a second embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 6 is an explanatory diagram showing the operation of the device of FIG.

FIG. 7 is a perspective view of an image forming apparatus according to a conventional example.

[Explanation of symbols]

10: electron-emitting device, 12: insulating substrate, 13a, 13
b: device wiring electrode, 14a, 14b: device electrode, 15:
Electron emission portion, 16: phosphor, 17: support frame, 19: face plate, 20: phosphor wiring electrode, 32: rear plate, 41: element driving circuit, 43: phosphor driving circuit, 4
5: recording medium, 48: light source, 49: lens array, 5
2: Support

──────────────────────────────────────────────────続 き Continued on the front page (72) Inventor Tetsuya Kaneko 3-30-2 Shimomaruko, Ota-ku, Tokyo Inside Canon Inc. (72) Inventor Hidetoshi Suzuki 3-30-2 Shimomaruko, Ota-ku, Tokyo Canon (56) References JP-A-61-221783 (JP, A) JP-A-3-250543 (JP, A) US Pat. No. 5,430,459 (US, A) (58) Fields investigated (Int. Cl. ⁷⁾ , DB name) H01J 31/12 G09F 9/30 362

Claims (10)

(57) [Claims] 1. A electron-emitting device, the light emitting element, and an image formation with a voltage applying means for applying a predetermined voltage to the luminous body
An apparatus , wherein the electron-emitting device emits an electron beam, and
One of the electron-emitting device, a set of a plurality light emitting member by the electron beam is intended to emit light in response to the predetermined voltage applied thereto, the predetermined electrostatic the luminous body to be marked pressurized <br / > are those resulting image of the light emitting pattern corresponding to the pressure, also the electron emission element and the light emitter are juxtaposed on the same substrate, and the voltage applying means to the light emitting element in a set all SANYO applying a voltage to the independently for the front
In one set of the plurality of light emitters,
The higher the distance from the electron emitter to the light emitter, the higher the voltage
Is applied to the light emitting body . 2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the plurality of light emitters constitute one pixel.
But constructed, the image forming apparatus according to claim 1. 3. A plurality of luminous bodies constituting said one pixel
There, 3 of R (red), G (green), B (blue)
The image forming apparatus according to claim 2 , wherein the image forming apparatus includes three light-emitting bodies exhibiting primary colors. 4. An R (red) constituting said one pixel.
C), three primary colors of G (green) and B (blue)
Of the three luminous bodies, the G (green) luminous body emits electrons.
B (blue) light emitter placed at the closest position to the output element
Is located far from the electron-emitting device.
The image forming apparatus according to claim 3. Wherein said voltage applying means comprises a modulation means for generating a voltage to be applied by modulating an information signal having information of the formed image, an image forming apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 4. Wherein said electron-emitting device is a cold cathode, an image forming apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 5. 7. The electron-emitting device has positive and negative electrodes and an electron-emitting portion between the electrodes, and emits electrons from the electron-emitting portion when a voltage is applied between the electrodes. the image forming apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 6 is intended. 8. A plurality of electron-emitting devices and a plurality of sets of luminous bodies corresponding to the plurality of electron-emitting devices are arranged in a matrix so as to correspond to each other. 8. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1, wherein an electron-emitting device is connected, and a luminous body is connected for each column. 9. The image forming apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 8 having the recording medium on which an image is recorded by irradiation of light from the light emitter. 10. The image forming apparatus according to claim 9 , further comprising: means for supporting a recording medium on which an image is recorded by irradiating light from said luminous body.