1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates to an image forming device.
2. Description of the Related Art
As an exposure head which selectively exposes a photosensitive body and which is used in an image forming device such as a printer using an electrophotographic process, a configuration including a light-emitting element array and a microlens array is proposed as in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2011-110762. As the light-emitting element, a Light Emitting Diode (LED) element, an organic Electro Luminescence (EL) element, or the like is used. In particular, when an organic EL element array is used as the exposure head, it is not necessary to arrange light-emitting elements with high accuracy as in the LED element array and the light-emitting elements can be monolithically formed on a substrate, so that it is possible to reduce the cost.
On the other hand, an image signal of each pixel in the light-emitting element array is determined by an area gray scale method such as a dither method and an error diffusion method in a gray scale presentation of a halftone image. Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2002-16802 proposes creating an image signal by a multi-value area gray scale method.
As a typical method of gray scale control of each light-emitting element, there is a pulse width modulation that controls the exposure time.
To perform the pulse width modulation, the number of thin film transistors (TFTs), which are elements of a peripheral circuit or a pixel circuit, increases, so that a decrease in yield and an increase in a substrate area according to an increase in the area of the entire area in which the TFTs are formed occur. Therefore, there is a problem that the cost increases.
Therefore, an object of the present invention is to provide an image forming device which is low cost and which provides a stable gray scale representation.
An image forming device of the present invention is an image forming device including a photosensitive body, a charging unit that charges the photosensitive body, an exposure unit that forms an electrostatic latent image on a surface of the photosensitive body, a developing unit that develops the electrostatic latent image as a toner image, a transfer unit that transfers the toner image to a transfer target member, and a fixing unit that fixes the transferred toner image to the transfer target member. The exposure unit includes a lens group having a plurality of lenses arrayed in a first direction and an element array which is arranged to face the lens group and includes a plurality of organic EL elements arrayed in parallel with the first direction on a substrate. A drive circuit including a plurality of transistor circuits that control luminance per unit time of each of the plurality of organic EL elements is arranged on the substrate of the element array. The transistor circuit controls the luminance of the organic EL element based on a signal created by an area gray scale method.
Further features of the present invention will become apparent from the following description of exemplary embodiments (with reference to the attached drawings).
Hereinafter, an embodiment of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings.
[Electrophotographic Image Forming Device]
An image forming device of the embodiment will be described with reference to
The image forming device 1 can form a full color image on a recording paper 100 (for example, a recording paper, a plastic sheet, and a cloth) according to image information. The image information is inputted into the image forming device 1 from an image reading device (not illustrated in the drawings) connected to the image forming device 1 or a host device such as a personal computer communicably connected to the image forming device 1. The image forming device 1 includes first, second, third, and fourth image forming units SY, SM, SC, and SK for forming images of colors of yellow (Y), magenta (M), cyan (C), and black (K). In the embodiment, the first to the fourth image forming units SY, SM, SC, and SK are arranged in a row in the horizontal direction. In the embodiment, configurations and operations of the first to the fourth image forming units SY, SM, SC, and SK are substantially the same except that the color of the formed image is different. Hereinafter, when the first to the fourth image forming units need not be distinguished from each other, the suffixes Y, M, C, and K, which are given to reference numerals to represent that an element is provided for any one of the colors in
In the embodiment, the image forming device 1 includes four drum-shaped electrophotographic photosensitive bodies juxtaposed in the horizontal direction, that is, photosensitive drums 10, as a plurality of image carriers. The photosensitive drum 10 is driven and rotated by a drive unit (drive source) not illustrated in
A charging roller 40 used as a charging unit is arranged around the photosensitive drum 10. The charging roller 40 uniformly negatively charges the surface of the photosensitive drum 10.
Next, an exposure head 30 used as an exposure unit that forms an electrostatic latent image on the photosensitive drum 10 by irradiating light based on an image signal is arranged. A predetermined portion on the photosensitive drum 10 is exposed by the exposure head 30 and the charge at the predetermined portion on the photosensitive drum 10 is reduced.
Further, a developing unit 20 used as a developing unit that develops the electrostatic latent image as a toner image is arranged around the photosensitive drum 10. In the embodiment, the developing unit 20 uses non-magnetic one-component developer, that is, toner, as developer. In the embodiment, the developing unit 20 performs development by causing a developing roller 21 used as a developer carrier to come into contact with the photosensitive drum 10. Specifically, in the embodiment, a voltage of the same charging polarity (negative polarity in the embodiment) as the charging polarity of the photosensitive drum 10 is applied to the developing roller 21 in the developing unit 20. Therefore, an electric field is generated between the developing roller 21 and the photosensitive drum 10 connected to the earth and negatively charged toner is attached to a portion (image portion, exposure potion), where the charge is reduced by exposure, on the photosensitive drum 10, so that the electrostatic latent image is developed.
Further, an intermediate transfer belt 50 used as an intermediate transfer body (a transfer target member) for transferring the toner image on the photosensitive drum 10 to a recording paper 100 is arranged to face the four photosensitive drums 10. Here, the intermediate transfer belt 50 formed by an endless type belt used as an intermediate transfer body is in contact with all the photosensitive drums 10 and circularly moves (rotates) in the arrow direction (counterclockwise direction) in
On the outer circumferential surface side of the intermediate transfer belt 50, a secondary transfer roller used as a secondary transfer unit is arranged at a position facing the secondary transfer counter roller 55. The secondary transfer roller 52 abuts and presses the secondary transfer counter roller 55 through the intermediate transfer belt 50 and forms the secondary transfer unit in which the intermediate transfer belt 50 and the secondary transfer roller 52 abut each other. Bias having the polarity opposite to the normal charging polarity of the toner is applied to the secondary transfer roller 52 from a secondary transfer bias power supply (high-voltage power supply) used as a secondary transfer bias application unit not illustrated in
Further, a cleaning unit 90 that cleans toner (transfer residual toner) remaining on the surface of the photosensitive drum 10 after the transfer is arranged.
In this way, in the rotation direction of the photosensitive drum 10, charging, exposure, development, transfer, and cleaning are performed in this order.
Finally, the recording paper 100 on which the toner image is transferred is supplied to a fixing device 80 used as a fixing unit. In the fixing device 80, heat and pressure are applied to the recording paper 100, so that the toner image is fixed to the recording paper 100.
Secondary transfer residual toner remaining on the intermediate transfer belt 50 after the secondary transfer process is cleaned by an intermediate transfer belt cleaning device 56.
The image forming device 1 can form a single color image or a multi-color image by using desired one or several (not all) image forming units.
The configuration of the image forming device described above is only an example for describing the embodiment and is not limited according to the gist of the present invention.
Next, the exposure head 30 will be described.
In the embodiment, the organic EL element 302 is a bottom emission type element and light is emitted through the substrate 305. The plurality of organic EL elements 302 are sealed by a sealing member (not illustrated in
The connector 304 is electrically connected to the drive circuit 303 by wiring and connected to a control board of a main body of the image forming device not illustrated in
The TFT circuit 306 includes five TFT elements. The five TFT elements are connected as illustrated in
On the other hand, a TFT circuit 316 illustrated in
In other words, in the case of the TFT circuit 306 that performs the amplitude modulation as in the embodiment, the number of TFT elements can be smaller than that of the TFT circuit 316 that performs the pulse width modulation. Therefore, in the case of the embodiment, it is possible to reduce the area where the drive circuit 303 is formed, so that it is possible to reduce the area of the substrate 305. When the area of the substrate 305 is reduced, the number of the element arrays 301 obtained from one large substrate can be increased, so that it is possible to reduce the cost.
When an LED element is used as a light emitting element, it is difficult to form a transistor circuit that controls a luminance per unit time of the organic EL element 302 on the same substrate on which a plurality of light emitting elements are arranged as in the embodiment. This is because the substrate on which the LED elements are formed is generally a GaAs substrate and a GaN substrate, so that it is difficult to form a transistor circuit. Therefore, when an LED element is used as a light emitting element, the size of an external circuit such as a main controller and a head controller increases. On the other hand, when the organic EL elements 302 and the drive circuit 303 (TFT circuits 306) are formed on the same glass substrate or Si substrate as in the embodiment, it is possible to reduce the size of external circuit and thus reduce the cost.
Next,
Next, the image forming device of the embodiment performs gray scale representation of a halftone image by combining a binary area gray scale method and the amplitude modulation method as a multi-value area gray scale method. Hereinafter, the gray scale representation of the embodiment will be described. The effect of combining the binary area gray scale method and the amplitude modulation method will be also described by comparing with a gray scale representation obtained by combining the binary area gray scale method and the pulse width modulation method as a multi-value area gray scale method.
First, the gray scale representation by a combination of the binary area gray scale method and the pulse width modulation method will be described with reference to
The pixel 605 in the unit cell 600 is a pixel where the pulse width modulation is performed and referred to as a gray scale control pixel. However, the gray scale control pixel is at least one pixel selected from the pixels in the unit cell 600 and is appropriately determined by a dither method or an error diffusion method which is an area gray scale method.
In
In a configuration that does not include the gray scale control pixel, in other words, when the gray scale is represented by only a binary area gray scale method, one pixel has only a binary pattern of an exposed state and an unexposed state, so that a unit cell can represent only 3×3=9 gray scales.
However, when the gray scale control pixel 605 is included in the unit cell 600, the light emitting control as described below can be performed. That is, it is possible to create an intermediate state in which a part is exposed and the other part is not exposed, in addition to the exposed state and the unexposed state, in each pixel. As a result, for example, it is possible to assign a data signal of 4 bits to the organic EL element 302 corresponding to each pixel, so that it is possible to obtain a gray scale representation of 3×3×24=144 gray scales by controlling the exposure time.
The gray scale control pixel 605 will be described in more detail with reference to
Further, it is possible to represent halftone image patterns of gray scales 65 to 80, in
Next, the gray scale representation by a combination of the binary area gray scale method and the amplitude modulation method will be described with reference to
A gray scale control pixel 705 is provided in the unit cell 700, so that the number of gray scales that can be represented is increased. Specifically, the amount of current of the organic EL element 302 corresponding to the gray scale control pixel 705 is controlled so that the gray scale control pixel 705 can have a plurality of values as the luminance value per unit time. By this configuration, the gray scale control pixel 705 has a plurality of values of luminance per unit time. Also in this configuration, it is possible to assign a data signal of 4 bits to the organic EL element 302 corresponding to each pixel, so that it is possible to obtain a gray scale representation of 3×3×24=144 gray scales equivalent to 600 dpi of 200 lpi by controlling the exposure time.
However, in the same manner as in the pulse width modulation method, the gray scale control pixel 705 is at least one pixel selected from the pixels in the unit cell 700 and is determined by a dither method or an error diffusion method which is an area gray scale method.
The gray scale control pixel 705 will be described in detail with reference to
Further, it is possible to represent halftone image patterns of gray scales 65 to 80, in
Exposure simulation results of cases, in which the binary area gray scale method is combined with the center-growth type pulse width modulation method and the amplitude modulation method, respectively, as a multi-value area gray scale method, are compared.
On the other hand,
In the above exposure simulations, the exposure distribution is calculated as an output when a spot shape after passing the lens group 310 described later is inputted corresponding to any area gray scale signal. Specifically, a fast Fourier transform is applied to an exposure image pattern formed by the input spot shape and the area gray scale signal and the exposure image pattern is convoluted. The input spot shape is standardized by an accumulated light amount per unit pixel when a full exposure is performed. The simulations are performed by forming the light emitting area of the organic EL element 302 into 42 μm×42 μm.
When comparing
In
In the electrophotographic image forming device, an electrostatic latent image is formed on the photosensitive drum 10 by irradiating light based on an image signal. Therefore, when the exposure distribution on the photosensitive drum 10 irradiated with light changes, latent image potential on the photosensitive drum 10 also changes. Therefore, by considering the change of the exposure distribution, it is possible to estimate the change of the latent image potential on the photosensitive drum 10. The luminance value 0.5 of the exposure distribution indicated here corresponds to a voltage value applied to the developing roller 21 described above. When a curve corresponding to the exposure distribution cross-section is located in an area higher than the luminance value 0.5, in other words, when the curve is higher than the alternate long and short dash line in
The luminance value 0.75 and the luminance value 0.25 represent a change of the developing bias under a high temperature and high humidity environment and a low temperature and low humidity environment. It is possible to evaluate the stability of the gray scale presentation under varying environment by comparing the changes of the line width variation (the distance between the sign ★ and the sign □ or Δ in
As illustrated in
When the luminance value becomes 0.25 or 0.75 due to environmental variation, a difference caused by difference of the gray scale representation occurs. In the center-growth type pulse width modulation, when the gray scale is 54, the difference between the line width variation when the luminance value is 0.25 and the line width variation when the luminance value is 0.75 is the greatest and the value of the difference is 29 μm. On the other hand, in the amplitude modulation, when the gray scale is 56, the difference is the greatest and the value of the difference is 21 μm. This result means that the line width variation with respect to the variation of the threshold luminance value is smaller in the amplitude modulation than in the center-growth type pulse width modulation. In summary, it can be said that the amplitude modulation method can perform more stable gray scale representation against environmental variation than the pulse width modulation.
In the dashed line 651 in
This is because the curve corresponding to the exposure distribution cross-section of the electrostatic latent image for each gray scale formed by the center-growth type pulse width modulation illustrated in
Although the gray scales 48 to 64 are described here as an example, it has also been confirmed that the amplitude modulation is more stable than the pulse width modulation in all gray scales other than the above gray scales.
In this way, it is possible to realize an image forming device having high stability against environmental variation at low cost by combining the amplitude modulation with the binary area gray scale as a gray scale representation of the exposure head 30.
Next, the lens group 310 according to the embodiment will be described.
In the embodiment, the X direction is referred to as an optical axis direction, the Y direction is referred to as a main array direction, and the Z direction is referred to as a sub-array direction. The main array direction is in parallel with a longitudinal direction in which the organic EL elements 302 are one-dimensionally arrayed in the element array 301. The sub-array direction is a direction corresponding to the rotation direction of the photosensitive drum 10.
A plurality of light shielding members 330 are arranged between the first lens array 320 and the second lens array 340. The light shielding member 330 plays a role of shielding a part of light beams (stray light that does not contribute to image formation) that pass through a lens in the first lens array 320 and enter a lens in the second lens array 340 in a main array cross-section.
A row of optical axes of each of a plurality of lenses (optical axis row) included in the second lens array 340 is positioned on the same line included in a surface between the first lens row 343 and the second lens row 344 in the second lens array 340. The first lens array 320 also has the same configuration. Further, the row of optical axes of each of a plurality of lenses (optical axis row) included in the first lens array 320 is positioned higher than the same line included in the surface between the first lens row 343 and the second lens row 344 in the second lens array 340. Thereby, in a ZX cross-section (hereinafter referred to as a main array cross-section) which is a cross-section perpendicular to the main array direction, a system is formed in which an inverted image of an object is formed and a level shift array (zigzag array) is realized. Hereinafter, a system that forms an erect unmagnification image of an object is referred to as an erect equal-magnification imaging system and a system that forms an inverted image of an object is referred to as an inverted imaging system.
The “level shift array (zigzag array)” in the embodiment is defined as follows: The level shift array is a configuration in which, in a configuration in which one lens array includes a plurality lens rows, optical axes of a plurality of lenses included in each of the plurality of lens rows do not correspond to each other in lenses adjacent to each other in the sub-array direction, are away from each other in the main array direction, and are located on the same line. Here, the lenses adjacent to each other in the sub-array direction are lenses closest to each other in the sub-array direction. The “adjacent to each other” includes a configuration in which lenses arranged in the sub-array direction are in contact with each other and a configuration in which lenses arrayed in the sub-array direction are arrayed with an intermediate in between.
Next, the lens group 310 used in the present invention will be described in detail with reference to
As illustrated in
Each light emitting point on the element array 301 forms an erect unmagnification image in the main array cross-section illustrated in
Here, as illustrated in
Each (321, 322, 341, and 342) of light incident surfaces and light emitting surfaces of the lenses in the first lens array 320 and the second lens array 340 illustrated in
SH=ΣCi,jYiZj (1)
Table 1 shows optical design values of each lens. In Table 1, G1 indicates a lens included in the first lens array 320 and R1 indicates a point at which the light incident surface of a lens and the optical axis of the lens intersect each other. R2 indicates a point at which the light emitting surface of a lens and the optical axis of the lens intersect each other. Therefore, G1R1 indicates a point at which the light incident surface 321 of a lens included in the first lens array 320 and the optical axis of the lens intersect each other. Further, G1R2 indicates a point at which the light emitting surface 322 of a lens included in the first lens array 320 and the optical axis of the lens intersect each other. The same goes for G2R1 and G2R2.
As shown in Table 1, in the embodiment, an intermediate image formation magnification β (details will be described later) of each lens in the main array cross-section is set to −0.45. However, β may be any value in a range in which an erect equal-magnification imaging system is formed in the main array direction.
As known from comparison between
Next, the effects associated with the lenses will be additionally described below. First, the effect of the level shift array (zigzag array) which is a lens array configuration of the embodiment will be described. For comparison, a lens array optical system is considered in which only one row of lens array is arrayed and there is not a plurality of rows of lens arrays in the sub-array direction. In the comparative example, the configuration (optical design values and the like) other than the above is assumed to be the same as that of the lens group according to the embodiment.
Next,
As illustrated in
As illustrated in
Although an example is described in which the lens group 310 includes two lens arrays, that is, the first lens array 320 and the second lens array 340, the lens group 310 is not limited to this. The lens group 310 may include three or more lens arrays arrayed in the X direction. In this case, as described above, at least either one of the first optical system and the second optical system may include two lenses. However, if the lens group 310 includes three or more lens arrays, the number of components increases, so that it is preferable that the lens group 310 includes two lens arrays.
Further, the lens optical system included in the lens group 310 may be formed by one lens array without dividing the lens optical system into the first optical system and the second optical system. Also in this case, it is considered to be able to obtain the effect as described above by forming one lens array into an erect equal-magnification imaging system in the main array cross-section and an inverted imaging system in the sub-array cross-section.
In the embodiment, the shapes of the lenses included in the upper row and the lenses included in the lower row correspond to a shape of a lens obtained by cutting and dividing one lens optical system at the main array cross-sections including the optical axis. In other words, in the main array direction, if the shortest distance ΔY from the optical axis of the lens in the lower row to the optical axis of the lens in the upper row closest to the optical axis of the lens in the lower row is 0 (when the optical axes are not arrayed zigzag), the lens surfaces of the lenses in the upper row and the lenses in the lower row adjacent to each other are configured to be able to be represented by the same expression. Even when the upper row and the lower row are arrayed with an intermediate in between, if the lens surfaces of the upper row and the lower row have shapes that can be represented by the same expression, the lenses can be easily shaped.
As illustrated in
In the embodiment, a configuration in which the optical axes of all the lenses in each lens row are located on the same line is described. Here, when the size of each luminous point of a light-emitting unit in the sub-array direction in the image forming device is defined as H and the maximum distance between the optical axis rows of each lens row in the sub-array direction is defined as Δ, it is defined that each optical axis is located on the same line if the following conditional expression (2) is satisfied.
Δ<(½)H (2)
When the distance between the optical axes in the sub-array direction is within a range defined by the conditional expression (2), images of each lens row are not away from each other, so that the effects of the present invention can be sufficiently obtained. The size H of each luminous point of the light-emitting unit in the sub-array direction is 25.3 μm. Therefore, when the maximum distance Δ between the optical axes in the sub-array direction is smaller than (½)H=(½)×42.3 μm=21.7 μm for all the lenses, the effects of the present invention can be sufficiently obtained.
While the present invention has been described with reference to exemplary embodiments, it is to be understood that the invention is not limited to the disclosed exemplary embodiments. The scope of the following claims is to be accorded the broadest interpretation so as to encompass all such modifications and equivalent structures and functions.
This application claims the benefit of Japanese Patent Application No. 2013-136161, filed Jun. 28, 2013 which is hereby incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.
Number | Date | Country | Kind |
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2013-136161 | Jun 2013 | JP | national |
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Number | Date | Country |
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2002-16802 | Jan 2002 | JP |
2011-110762 | Jun 2011 | JP |
Number | Date | Country | |
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20150002596 A1 | Jan 2015 | US |