Facsimile and static presentation processing – Static presentation processing
Reexamination Certificate
1998-05-19
2002-05-07
Coles, Edward (Department: 2722)
Facsimile and static presentation processing
Static presentation processing
C358S443000, C358S296000, C358S452000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06384921
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates to a printing method and apparatus and a printing system including the printing apparatus and, more particularly, to a printing method and apparatus which print an image on a recording medium by using a full-line printhead having a printing width equivalent to the width of the recording medium, and a printing system including the printing apparatus.
Vending machines for the sale of seals or the like on which images obtained by synthesizing photographic images of the faces of customers with digital images are printed have recently been known. In the vending machines for the sale of such printed images, the added values of printed images to be sold increase if color illustrations and characters are printed together. Demands have arisen for the use of such printed images as personal cards for casual use and techniques of printing the names of customers on color seals. The printing apparatus used in such a vending machine is required to print color images to increase the added value of printed matter and print images at high speed to handle requests from many customers.
Conventional page printers including the above printing apparatus bitmap all data, corresponding to one page of printing paper, sent from a host computer (to be referred to as a host hereinafter), into a print buffer, and print an image. In this case, even when a plurality of identical patterns are to be printed on one sheet, all the pattern data have to be transmitted from the host or the pattern data are pre-registered in a memory in the printer, and the pattern data are bitmapped in a plurality of areas in the print buffer in accordance with a command from the host. The method of bitmapping the pattern data pre-registered in the memory into the print buffer in accordance with a command from the host, and printing out on the sheet has been often used to shorten the time required for bitmapping the data received from the host.
In the above vending machine, when a photographic image of the face of a customer, the name of the customer, an image, an illustration, and the like are to be printed in color, the name and the like inputted by the customer are synthesized with the image, the illustration, and the like to generate print image data. In this case, as described above, the print data corresponding to one page (one entire sheet) is sent from the host (main control unit) of the vending machine to the printing apparatus. The printing apparatus then analyzes the received print data and prints the corresponding images on one printing paper sheet. Such color image data is generally constituted by a plurality of color component data such as yellow (Y), magenta (M), and cyan (C) component data. For example, a printing apparatus having four printheads for printing Y, M, C, and K (black) color images requires image data four times larger in amount than that required to print a black-and-white (or monochrome) image.
If all such color image data corresponding to one page are bitmapped into bit image data by the host and transmitted therefrom to the printing apparatus, a much longer time is required for the host to bitmap data into image data and transmit the data to the printing apparatus. As a result, a much longer time is required to print images on one sheet. This makes customers wait for a longer period of time, and decreases the processing performance needed to satisfy requirements from customers.
In addition, according to the above conventional pattern bitmapping, when a plurality of identical patterns are to be printed on a plurality of recording media, the printout time can be effectively shortened. When, however, a plurality of identical patterns are to be consecutively printed on one recording medium, the printout time is not shortened so much.
Furthermore, in the above conventional pattern bitmapping, a large amount of data must be transmitted from the host or another storage medium is required to store pattern data. The following problems are therefore posed.
When all the data corresponding to one page of printing paper are to be sent from the host, it takes time to transfer the data as described above. The efficiency of bitmapping data into the buffer greatly deteriorates. For this reason, the period of time between the start of data transfer and the start of printout operation (to be referred to as “the first page print time” hereinafter) becomes very long.
When pattern data are pre-registered in a storage medium such as a memory card, and the patterns are bitmapped into a plurality of areas in the print buffer in accordance with a command from the host, the storage medium must be incorporated in the printer or at least an interface for connecting the storage medium to the printer is required. This greatly increases the cost of the printer.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a printing method and apparatus capable of increasing the printing speed, and a printing system including the printing apparatus.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a printing method and apparatus which shorten the time required for image processing in a data source and reduce the amount of data transmitted to the printing apparatus so as to shorten the time required to print image data, and a printing system including the printing apparatus.
It is still another object of the present invention to provide a printing method and apparatus in which basic image data is registered in the printing apparatus in advance, and a desired image can be printed by only designating the printing position of the image data on a recording medium, and a printing system including the printing apparatus.
According to one aspect of the present invention, the foregoing object is attained by providing a printing apparatus for printing an image on a recording medium by using a printhead, comprising: a memory storing image data sent from a data source, and copied image data for an image print; storing means for the image data which has been sent from the data source; copying means for copying the image data stored in the memory to an address in the memory corresponding to a printing position in accordance with information of the printing position on the recording medium which is designated by the data source; and printing means for outputting the copied image data by the copying means in the memory to the printhead, and printing the image.
According to another aspect of the present invention, the foregoing object is attained by providing a printing method of printing an image on a recording medium by using a printhead, comprising the steps of: storing image data sent from a data source in a memory; copying the image data stored in the memory to an address in the memory which corresponds to a printing position on the recording medium in accordance with information of the printing position which is designated by the data source; and outputting the copied image data in the memory in the copying step to the printhead, and printing the image.
According to still another aspect of the present invention, the foregoing object is attained by providing a printing system including the above-described printing apparatus, wherein the data source comprises transmission means for transmitting designated image data to the printing apparatus; and position transmission means for transmitting position information designating a printing position of image data on a recording medium to the printing apparatus.
It is still another object of the present invention to provide a printing apparatus and method which can print at high speed by improving data bitmapping efficiency even when identical patterns are to be repeatedly printed on the same page of a recording medium.
In order to attain the foregoing object, the above apparatus further comprises input means for inputting the image data and a printing command for the image data, wherein the memory includes a first memory area used for storing the image data and a second memory area used for storing the copied imag
Hasegawa Masahide
Inaba Moriyoshi
Ishikawa Kouhei
Katayama Akira
Moritoki Kenichi
Canon Aptex Kabushiki Kaisha
Coles Edward
Fitzpatrick ,Cella, Harper & Scinto
Lamb Twyler
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