JPS59127471A - Scanning picture recording device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To make unevenness of scanning on a photosensitive material inconspicuous by exposing the photosensitive material subordinary with low illuminance after picture exposure in a scanning picture recording device which performs the picture exposure by making a main scan by a laser beam. CONSTITUTION:The recorder 1 takes out photosensitive material sheets 2 stacked in a magazine 3 by an air suction holder 4 and inserts it into a conveyance path 5. The sheet 2 stops by abutting on a stopper 9 and stop there, and is nipped by a nip roller with a subscanning drum 6. Then, the stopper 9 moves back from the path and the drum 6 is rotated mechanically by a servomotor in a direction C. The laser beam from a main scanning light source 7 is deflected by a main scanning means 7 to scan the sheet on the drum 6 axially. The scanned sheet 2 is carried in a subordinate exposure device 10 through a conveyance path 5a to perform the subordinate exposure with a low-illuminance light source 11, and sent to an automatic developing machine 13 to carry out development. The development is performed within 20 seconds afer the subordinate exposure, and then a picture with inconspious unevenness of scanning is obtained.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to an image recording apparatus, and more particularly to a scanning image recording apparatus in which a silver halide photographic material is scanned with a laser beam, exposed to an image, and then developed.

Conventionally, a scanning image recording device uses a light modulator to modulate a recording laser beam (for example, a He-Ne laser), which is a high-intensity light, to scan a silver halide photographic light-sensitive material and expose image information. A scanning image recording apparatus is known in which the photosensitive material is then developed using an automatic processor or the like to record image information on the photosensitive material. The above exposure operation is carried out in a recorder, and this recorder usually uses a main scanning means such as a galvanometer mirror that scans the recording laser beam onto the photosensitive material-F, and a motor etc. to automatically scan the photosensitive material. It has a sub-scanning means for mechanically feeding the image.

However, in such a recording device, the accuracy of main scanning and the speed of sub-scanning are not necessarily constant, resulting in irregularities in the width between scanning lines, resulting in uneven shading, so-called scanning unevenness, when developing photosensitive materials. occurs. In particular, when a normal photosensitive material with a large γ coefficient (for example, γ>2) is used, the above-mentioned scanning unevenness is likely to be noticeable. In order to avoid this, it is necessary to use a specially designed photosensitive material with a small γ coefficient, but such a photosensitive material does not currently exist and must be specially developed and manufactured.

The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and it is possible to make scanning unevenness that occurs on a photosensitive material due to disturbances in main scanning accuracy or mechanical sub-scanning speed noticeable without using a specially designed photosensitive material. It is an object of the present invention to provide a scanning image recording device that can obtain images that are visually easy to see.

The above object is to provide a scanning image recording apparatus that performs image exposure by sub-scanning a photosensitive material with a mechanical feeding means and main scanning with a recording laser beam, and then developing the photosensitive material to record an image. This has been achieved by a scanning image recording apparatus characterized in that a sub-exposure device is provided for performing sub-exposure that uniformly exposes the photosensitive material to low-intensity light after image exposure.

It is conventionally known that a sensitizing effect can be obtained by subjecting a light-sensitive material to sub-exposure at low illuminance before or after main exposure (for example, Makoto Kikuchi, "Photo Chemistry", New Edition, pp. 156-157, Kyoritsu Zenshoban 21). (1973)), L. Kashinakarakowa, et al.'s reports do not discuss the effect of sub-exposure when the main exposure is given by high-intensity, short-time exposure such as a laser beam, and in general, It has been recognized that the sensitizing effect and the effect of reducing the γ coefficient are greater when the sub-exposure is applied before the main exposure than after.

However, the present inventors found that when main exposure is given by a laser beam, as will be described later, there is almost no effect even if sub-exposure at low illumination is performed before main exposure, whereas main exposure is The present invention was developed based on the discovery that a great effect can be obtained when applied after the treatment.

In this way, in the present invention, sub-exposure with low illuminance is performed after image exposure with a laser beam, which makes it possible to reduce the γ coefficient of the photosensitive material used, which originally has a high γ coefficient.
Even when a photosensitive material having a coefficient is used, it is possible to obtain a high-quality image with inconspicuous scanning unevenness. In addition, this low-intensity sub-exposure increases the apparent sensitivity of the photosensitive material, making it possible to compensate for the deterioration of the laser light source output over time. Can handle change with a wide range of tolerance.

Hereinafter, embodiments of the apparatus of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 shows one embodiment of the present invention. The recorder 1 of this embodiment is constructed so that the conveyance path of the photosensitive material sheets 2 is approximately vertical, and the sheets 2 are stacked and stored in a magazine 3 placed upright at the top. An air suction holder 4 is disposed at the lower part of the opening side of the magazine 3, and this holder 4 appropriately takes out the sheets 2 stored in the magazine 3 and inserts them into the conveyance path 5. The sheet 2 comes into contact with the stopper 9 and stops, and then is nipped between the sheet 2 and the sub-scanning drum by a nip roller. When this clamping is completed, the stopper 9 retreats from the sheet path.

A sub-scanning drum 6 is provided in the middle of the conveyance path 5, with the curved side portion thereof being located. This drum 6
is driven and rotated in the direction of arrow C in the figure by a mechanical feed means such as a servo motor. Further, a light beam such as a laser beam emitted from the main scanning light source 7 is deflected by a main scanning means 8 such as a polygon mirror or a galvanometer mirror, and passes over the sheet 2 that is in close contact with the peripheral side of the drum 60. scan in the axial direction.

Next, the scanning cylinder sheet 2 is conveyed through the conveyance path 5a and carried into the sub-exposure device 10. In this embodiment, the sub-exposure device 1
0 is installed on the path connecting the scanning recorder 1 and the automatic developing machine 13, but in some cases it may be installed after the scanning section in the scanning recorder 1, or in the part before the developer tank in the automatic developing machine 13. It may be incorporated into

A low-temperature light source 11 (for example, a tungsten light bulb) is provided in the sub-exposure device 10, and the sheet 2 is sub-exposed using the light source 11 (for example, a tungsten light bulb). The wavelength of the sub-exposure is preferably closer to the wavelength of the main exposure, so in the present invention, a red filter 12 is provided between the tungsten bulb and the photosensitive material in accordance with the He-Ne laser wavelength.
(for example, 5C-62).

The amount of sub-exposure can be changed as appropriate depending on the γ coefficient inherent to the photosensitive material used, the sensitivity of the photosensitive material, the amount of laser light, etc., but generally the γ coefficient of the final image is set to 1.0.
It is desirable to set the amount to a value that is approximately 2.0 to 2.0, particularly 16±0.1.

The sheet 2 subjected to sub-exposure in this manner is then carried into an automatic developing machine and developed.

At this time, it is preferable that the development be performed within 20 seconds after the sub-exposure, since the longer the time from the sub-exposure to the development, the more the effect of the sub-exposure is lost.

Figure 2 shows a tungsten bulb and a red filter (SC).
-62) is used as a sub-exposure light source to subject a photosensitive material to low-intensity sub-exposure. The scale on the horizontal axis represents the exposure amount logarithmically, and the scale on the vertical axis represents the optical density.

As shown in Fig. 2, compared to the characteristic curve a when only image exposure is performed, the characteristic curve when sub-exposure is performed after image exposure is that the foot sensitivity increases and the slope of the characteristic curve ( γ
) is becoming gentler (about 1C). Note that characteristic curve C is obtained when front sub-exposure is performed instead of rear sub-exposure 20 seconds before image exposure under the same conditions as the above-mentioned post-sub exposure. In this case, almost no effect can be obtained on both the slope of the curve and the sensitivity.

FIG. 3 shows a characteristic curve when performing high-intensity rear exposure, which is solid scanning exposure using a He-N e laser light source. The diameter of this laser beam is 150 μm as in image exposure. Further, this high-intensity rear exposure was performed 20 seconds after the image exposure, and development processing was performed 20 seconds after the sub-exposure was performed.

The output of the laser light source or the scanning time at this time was set to a value determined in advance through experiments so that the Kapuso density would match the 1-hour blurring density only during image exposure.

The characteristic curve e at this time cannot achieve a significant effect in terms of slope and sensitivity compared to the characteristic curve d when only image exposure is performed. Furthermore, there was almost no difference in the effect even if the above-mentioned high-intensity rear exposure was performed by changing the laser beam diameter or by setting the optical system to an oil mist state to blur the beam spot.

In this way, when the main exposure is performed using a laser beam, there is almost no effect in the front sub-exposure, and when high-intensity light is used in the post-sub-exposure, almost no effect is obtained; It is clear that only the rear sub-exposure can increase the foot sensitivity and reduce the γ coefficient accordingly.

As explained in detail above, according to the present invention, since the low-illuminance rear exposure is given in the sub-exposure device, the optical density gradient with respect to the exposure amount becomes gentle, and when performing image exposure, the mechanical feeding means Scanning irregularities on the final image due to uneven feeding and main scanning disturbances caused by It is possible to extend it.

Further, by freely changing the power consumption and irradiation time of the sub-exposure light source, it is possible to cope with variations in the photosensitive material and the output of the laser light source.

41 plane cA paralysis gear a Explanation Fig. 1 is a schematic diagram showing one embodiment of the scanning image recording device according to the present invention, Fig. 2 is a graph showing the exposure amount-optical density characteristic curve according to the present embodiment, Fig. 3 is an exposure amount-optical density characteristic curve when performing high-intensity rear exposure.

1...Scanning image recording ticket 2...Scanning sheet of photosensitive material) 6...Drum for sub-scanning 8.
... Main scanning means 10 ... Sub-exposure device 13
...Automatic processor Figure 1/ Figure 2 ogE Figure 3 ogE

Claims (1)

[Claims] In a scanning image recording apparatus that performs image exposure by sub-scanning a photosensitive material with a mechanical feeding means and main scanning with a recording laser beam, and then developing the photosensitive material to record an image, after the image exposure, A scanning image recording apparatus comprising: a sub-exposure device for performing sub-exposure of uniformly exposing the photosensitive material to low-intensity light.