An information processing apparatus includes a processor configured to: acquire physical property information on physical properties of a recording medium and on physical properties of an ink to be ejected onto the recording medium and setting information on a setting of a device configured to eject the ink onto the recording medium, the ink including a first ink and a second ink, derive an action amount using the physical property information and the setting information, the action amount relating to an action of the second ink ejected at a position different from a position where the first ink is ejected, the second ink ejected being acted upon by behavior of the first ink, and output the action amount.

A control device is configured to: obtain target image data; generate dot data using the target image data; and control a print execution device to print a print image using the dot data by executing: a first partial printing of forming the dots in an overlapping area and a first non-overlapping area; and a second partial printing of forming the dots in the overlapping area and a second non-overlapping area. The control device generates data of the dot data corresponding to the overlapping area by executing an overlapping area processing including first processing for values of pixels within a first range and second processing for values of pixels within a second range, the first processing including lowering a density of an image to be printed in the overlapping area.

An information processing apparatus includes a processor configured to: acquire physical property information on physical properties of a recording medium and physical properties of ink to be ejected onto the recording medium and setting information on a setting of a device configured to eject the ink onto the recording medium; derive an action amount using the physical property information and the setting information, the action amount relating to action of the recording medium applied by the ink ejected onto the recording medium; and output the action amount.

An information processing apparatus includes a processor configured to: acquire physical property information on physical properties of a recording medium and on physical properties of ink to be ejected onto the recording medium and setting information on a setting of a device configured to eject the ink onto the recording medium, the ink including a first ink and a second ink; derive a feature quantity relating to characteristics of the ink based on behavior of the first ink to be ejected onto the recording medium and of the second ink to be ejected to a position adjacent to the first ink ejected, using the physical property information and the setting information; and output information on graininess of an image to be formed on the recording medium based on the feature quantity.

A recording device includes a recording unit configured to discharge a plurality of colors of ink, and a control unit configured to control the recording unit to perform recording of an image on a recording medium, wherein the control unit is configured to perform color expansion processing to copy, to a target pixel, a recording amount of first ink included in another pixel, the target pixel and the other pixel configuring image data representing the image, the target pixel being adjacent to the other pixel, the other pixel including the recording amount of the first ink of the plurality of colors of ink, the target pixel including a recording amount of second ink of the plurality of colors of ink, and cause the recording unit to perform recording based on the image data after the color expansion processing. The target pixel does not include the recording amount of the first ink, and the second ink has a different color than the first ink.

A printing apparatus prints an image by applying ink to a print surface of an inclined print medium using a print head. A control apparatus for the printing apparatus acquires information on an inclination of the print surface. Based on the information, printing is controlled according to a print condition corresponding to a magnitude of the inclination of the print surface.

A method of printing using a print head comprising first and second print arrays, each comprising a plurality of nozzles. Each of the first print array nozzles emits a droplet of a first volume and each of the second print array nozzles emits a droplet of a second volume, wherein the first volume is less than the second volume. The method comprises: a. receiving image data comprising a received tone value for a pixel; b. selecting one of the print arrays corresponding to the pixel location; c. mapping the received tone value to a mapped tone value using a tone mapping for the selected print array; d. comparing the mapped tone value with a threshold value for the location of the pixel; and e. generating a control signal for the selected print array if the mapped tone value corresponds to the threshold value in a predetermined manner.

An image processing apparatus generates dot data for printing an image on a printing medium by using dots of different sizes formed by a plurality of nozzles ejecting ink. The image processing apparatus includes a first acquisition unit that acquires dot data specifying printing or non-printing of each of the dots of a plurality of sizes for each pixel, a specification unit that specifies a dot having a strong possibility of being pulled by a dot having landed earlier on the printing medium of dots in the dot data, and a correction unit that corrects a dot specified by the specification unit in the dot data. The image processing apparatus can output an image whose banding is unlikely to be recognized by suppressing image defect due to a change of dots accompanying liquid droplet interference.

With a conventional method of estimating an application amount of a clear recording material from a color of a patch, it is difficult to realize high accuracy, similar colors are sometimes exhibited in measurement results even if there is a significant difference in the application amount of a clear ink. In contrast, with a disclosed configuration of estimating an application amount of a clear recording material from a reflection intensity of a patch, measurement results that exhibit a one-dimensional increase of a relationship between the application amount of the clear recording material and the reflection intensity are acquired, so that the accuracy of application amount estimation increases.

Systems, methods, software for monitoring usage of a recording medium in an image forming apparatus. In one embodiment, a usage monitor receives a raster image, and identifies thresholds that distinguish different intensity levels reproduced by different drop sizes of the recording material. The usage monitor identifies a set of pixel values for a block of pixels from the raster image, performs a vectorized comparison of the set of pixel values to each of the thresholds to generate sets of comparison bits, determines a number of set bits in each of the sets of comparison bits, and updates a threshold counter for each of the thresholds based on the number of set bits. The usage monitor may then compute drop counts for different drop sizes based on the threshold counter for each of the thresholds.