An object of the present invention is to provide an image processing apparatus capable of combining a group element so that a color intended by a user is output ultimately even in the case where flattening is performed on the way of the processing performed on the group.

Methods and systems for thickening an interior region of a fill object are described. The method includes receiving a print job including an input image, and converting into a digital bitmap image comprised of an array of pixels, each pixel being assigned with a pixel value and an object tag information. Based on this, each pixel is defined as one of a boundary pixel of the input image, an edge pixel of the fill object in the input image, and an interior pixel of the fill object. Thereafter, the fattening of the edge pixels of the fill object, is followed by the fattening of the interior pixels of the fill object, for applying thickening to the interior region. After this, an output image is generated.

An image processing apparatus performs: acquiring target image data representing a target image including a plurality of pixels, the target image data including a plurality of pixel values each having a plurality of component values; generating image data, the image data being one of first and second component data respectively including a plurality of first and second pixel values, each of the plurality of first and second pixel values being respectively related to maximum and minimum values among the plurality of component values of corresponding one of the plurality of pixels; calculating a plurality of edge strengths corresponding to respective ones of the plurality of pixels using the image data to generate edge strength data including the plurality of edge strengths; and specifying a plurality of edge pixels included in the target image. The specifying includes binarizing the edge strength data to generate binary image data.

An image processing apparatus includes an image processor that performs error diffusion processing by applying an error diffusion matrix to multi-valued image data having pixels two-dimensionally arranged, so as to convert the multi-valued image data into binary image data. The binarization unit applies an error diffusion matrix in which the diffusion coefficient of a pixel diagonal to a focused-on pixel is greater than those of other pixels.

A method for improving the print quality of graphic elements, in particular vectorized letter graphics, in PDF documents in the prepress stage of a printing process by using a computer, includes analyzing the page content of the PDF document by using the computer and saving the page content in a suitable data structure, searching the data structure for graphic elements, in particular letter graphics, that fulfill specific predefined criteria relating to an evaluation of the height and width of the graphic paths of graphic elements that are present in the PDF document, by using the computer, converting the selected graphic elements into image masks by rendering the selected graphic elements on the computer and substituting the generated image masks for the originally selected graphic elements in the PDF document by using the computer. The PDF document with the generated image masks are printed on a printing machine.

A printing apparatus includes a reception unit that receives outline information representing an outline of a character, a generation unit that generates, using the outline information, a bitmap including pixels corresponding to the character, the pixels being associated with a graphic attribute, a changing unit that refers an attribute associated with a pixel adjacent to one of the pixels corresponding to the character, and changes a density value of the adjacent pixel associated with the referred attribute being different from a graphic attribute and a character attribute to a density which is based on a density value of the one pixel, and a printing unit that prints an image based on the bitmap after the change.

An object of the present invention is to provide an image processing apparatus capable of combining a group element so that a color intended by a user is output ultimately even in the case where flattening is performed on the way of the processing performed on the group.

An object of the present invention is to provide an image processing apparatus capable of combining a group element so that a color intended by a user is output ultimately even in the case where flattening is performed on the way of the processing performed on the group.

A system directs a laser beam to mark a material with an alphanumeric code. Character and quality information corresponding to a mark to apply to the material with the laser beam can be received, a font definition that specifies character segments can be obtained, a set of multiple spaced locations can be generated from the character segments in accordance with the character and quality information, and the material can be marked with the laser beam by directing the laser beam to dwell at the locations and move between the locations without deactivating the laser beam.

A printer generates intermediate data that is a multivalued image based on image data to be printed, and converts the generated intermediate data into two gray scales by dither processing or the like to generate a binarized image. Further, the printer causes a printing device to execute printing based on the generated binarized image. The printer detects character data from the image data before generating the intermediate data, adds a broken line to an edge of the character represented by the character data when a size of the character represented by the detected character data is a predetermined size or more, and generates intermediate data based on the character to which the broken line is added. The printer does not add a broken line when the size of the character represented by the character data is less than the predetermined size.