JPS6145672A - Split print method in printer - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To obtain a high picture quality print picture by applying plural number of overlapped printing as to dots at the boundary of split so as to erase thin white lines produced on a printed picture. CONSTITUTION:A picture data D1 is read in a random access memory RAM of a line memory according to an address represented by an address section Adr. A data D2 of a random access memory RAM is inputted to a read only memory ROM1 in which a gradation data of duplicated print is given and the ROM1 is combined with a read only memory ROM2 selecting the overlapped dot, a data D3 corresponding to an energy is transferred to a head H from the read only memory ROM1 through a comparator and a timer T0 and then printed.

Description

[Detailed Description of the Invention] [Field of Application of the Invention] The present invention relates to a division printing method in a printer,
In particular, the present invention relates to a divided printing method for a printer that divides blocks and reduces density unevenness at the boundaries of divided blocks.

[Background of the invention]

Block division methods in printers have been used for some time, but density unevenness exists at block boundaries, and countermeasures have been essential.

To deal with this problem, the method described in JP-A-58-150372 changes the arrangement of the blocks and divides them into blocks in a staggered manner. Not only is there a risk that the circuit may become complicated, but there are also cases where white lines stand out due to the small influence of neighboring dots, and this problem has not yet been adequately addressed and there is still room for improvement. Met.

[Purpose of the invention]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION An object of the present invention is to provide a divided printing method for a printer that can obtain high-quality prints with inconspicuous boundaries by printing one or more dots at block boundaries one on top of the other. be.

[Summary of the invention]

The divided printing method in a printer according to the present invention is a printer that performs divided printing using a thermal head, and performs overlapping printing of one dot at the dividing boundary or a plurality of dots at the boundary twice or more than two times. This is how it was done.

As a supplementary note, the following points apply.

In the present invention, one or more dots are printed overlapping each other in order to eliminate the thin portions at the boundaries that occur when blocks are divided. Overlapping dots are printed twice or more, for example, at a lower value than the original data, so that there is little change in density from adjacent dots, and sudden changes in density are suppressed. This is to obtain almost the same image.

[Embodiments of the invention]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS An embodiment of a divided printing method in a printer according to the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.

Here, FIG. 1 is an explanatory diagram of the resistive heating element in the printer head and the energy distribution during divided blocks, and FIG.
The figure is a print trajectory diagram for two-divided blocks, and Figure 3 is:
FIG. 4 is a diagram illustrating a schematic configuration of a divided block printing circuit of a printer. In FIG. 4, white areas are a phenomenon explanatory diagram during conventional printing, and FIGS. 5 and 6 are diagrams illustrating gradation characteristics of overlapping dots.

That is, to be more specific, first, Figure 1 shows
As an example, the arrangement of the resistive heating elements and the electrical signals It and (2) are shown when the blocks are divided into two. Figure 2 shows an example of printing when the blocks are divided into two, and Figure 3 is a schematic diagram of the circuit when the blocks are divided into two. be.

In this embodiment, however, each dot at the dividing boundary is printed twice.

The thermal head of a printer using thermal transfer is generally
As shown in FIG. 1, resistance heating elements R11 to R211 are arranged, and data corresponding to information is transferred to the resistance heating elements and recorded on paper.

Conventional printing methods include resistive heating elements R11l~
There is a method of printing by driving up to R2° all at once, but this has the advantage of being able to print in a short time, but has the disadvantage of requiring a large amount of instantaneous power.

As a method to reduce this instantaneous power, the head can be divided into multiple parts.1. There is a block division method, but this method has the disadvantage that data transfer takes time.

However, if one of the two methods is adopted, a block division method with smaller instantaneous power is often adopted.

For example, in the conventional method of dividing into two blocks and not performing overprinting, as shown in FIG. 4, when printing resistive heating elements &1-R1, the boundary resistive heating elements , since it is not affected by R21,
If the dot area indicated by diagonal lines is small, or when printing the next block, the resistive heating element R21 should be replaced with the same R1n.
Since the dot area is not affected by this, the dot area becomes smaller, resulting in a thin white area g, which often causes lines to be visible in the print.

As mentioned above, in FIG. 1, as an example, the resistance heating elements R11 to R2. and energy El and E2 distributions.

When printing the first block [■], the energy E! of the print signal 100 is applied to the resistance heating elements &1 to R1°-1. is applied, and the resistance heating element R1 becomes the boundary.
An energy E2 lower than the above-mentioned energy El is added to .

Next, when printing the second block (II), apply the 100-chi energy E1 of the print signal to the resistive heating elements R21 to R2n, and apply the same energy as before to the resistive heating element R1° at the boundary of the first block. A low energy E2 is applied.

As shown in FIG. 2, only one dot of the resistive heating element Ram corresponding to the dividing boundary on the two lines of Al is printed overlappingly (twice).

However, if the number of divisions is 3 or more, 1 which is the boundary
As for the dots, similar to the above, the dots are overprinted twice with an energy of 100- or less of each image signal. However, in this case, the same effect can be obtained even if the printing is repeated three times, which is the same as the number of divisions.

Next, for the same purpose, multiple dots may be printed twice or more than once from the boundary.

In terms of circuitry, as shown in Figure 3, the image data DI is
Read into the line memory RAM according to the address indicated by the address field Adr, put the data D2 in the RAM into ROM1 containing the gradation data for overprint printing, combine it with ROM 2 that selects overlapping dots, and read the energy El, E2 from ROMI. The data D3 corresponding to the data D3 is transferred to the head H through a comparator and a timer To to be printed.

When one dot as described above is selected as the dot to be overlapped, the signal related to the energy E2 of the dot to be overlapped may be generated by the method shown in FIG.

That is, one is, for example, when the maximum density gradation is IF,
The energy of El is the maximum IF as shown in the straight line,
The energy of R2 is set to a value obtained by multiplying IF by α (<1.0).

The range from IFXα to 00 may be a straight line like the solid line ■, or a curved or broken line like the edge line ■, which can be used depending on the type of head and machine. ~■ are related to gradation data.

In addition, when printing two or more dots overlapping each other, store one or more pieces of data related to straight lines ■ to ■ shown in Figure 6 in ROMI, and use them in combination, or use the same If the optimum conditions are selected by using data for multiple dots, the same image as batch printing can be obtained.

Furthermore, in the case of overstriking with energy E2 shown in the embodiment of FIG. 1, E 2 + E 2 = E 3 + E
4, the same effect can be obtained by applying energies Es and R4 that are different from R2, and setting E 3+ E < to 2E2.

〔Effect of the invention〕

According to the divided printing method of the present invention, compared to batch printing, the instantaneous power can be reduced to (1/number of divisions), so the power source for the head can be made smaller and lighter. Moreover, by overprinting, thin white lines that have appeared in the printed image can be erased, and a high-quality printed image can be obtained.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

Figure 1 is an explanatory diagram of the resistive heating element in the printer head and the energy distribution during divided blocks.
Fig. 3 is a schematic diagram of the printer's circuit during split block printing, Fig. 4 shows the outline of the printer's circuit during conventional printing, and Fig. 5.6 shows the overlapping dots. FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating gradation characteristics. R11l~几21... Resistance heating element, It, I2.
...Electrical signal, Eo...100% energy of print signal, R2...Energy lower than El, H...
Head, Adr...address section. Figure 1 Figure 2 ITL ↓ Figure 3 Figure 4-

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A printer that performs divisional printing using a thermal head, characterized in that one dot at the dividing boundary or a plurality of dots at the boundary are overprinted twice or more than once. A dividing printing method for a printer. 2. In the product described in claim 1, the resistive heating element for overprinting has 100% of each image signal.
A divided printing method in a printer in which the following energy is applied twice or more times. 3. The divided printing method in a printer according to claim 2, in which the same energy is applied to the resistance heating element that performs overlapping printing the number of times the printing is overlapping. 4. The divided printing method in a printer according to claim 2, wherein different energies are applied to the resistance heating elements that perform overlapping printing to perform overlapping printing. 5. In the product described in claim 1, the printer includes a ROM 2 for selecting overlapping dots or gradations.
and a ROM 1 having at least two gradation data.