An inkjet printing apparatus includes a head, a platen, a platen absorbent that temporarily stores ink ejected from the head, a waste ink storage container that stores the ink discharged from the platen absorbent, and an estimation unit that, in a case where the platen is divided into a plurality of regions in a direction intersecting a conveyance direction of the printing medium, estimates an amount of ink stored in the waste ink storage container based on a position of a region to which the ink is ejected by the head and an amount of ink ejected to the region.

An inkjet printing device includes a stage part including a stage, an inkjet head part including at least one inkjet head that disposes an ink on the stage, the ink including dipoles and a solvent having the dipoles, a heat treatment device that removes the solvent, a first sensing part that measures a position of the ink disposed on the stage, a second sensing part that measures a position of the inkjet head, and a third sensing part that measures a position of each of the dipoles disposed on the stage. A dipole aligning method includes disposing an ink on a substrate, the ink including dipoles and a solvent having the dipoles, generating an electric field on the substrate and disposing the dipoles on the substrate by the electric field, removing the solvent, and measuring a position of each of the dipoles disposed on the substrate.

A printing apparatus includes: a print head that includes a plurality of nozzles ejecting an ink and performs printing on a print target; and at least one processor that controls an ejection operation of the print head based on ejection specification data defining ejection of the ink. At least a “first mode” and a “second mode” are provided with respect to the application of the ejection specification data, and the processor switches between the “first mode” and the “second mode” based on a set printing density.

An ink printing process employs per-nozzle droplet volume measurement and processing software that plans droplet combinations to reach specific aggregate ink fills per target region, guaranteeing compliance with minimum and maximum ink fills set by specification. In various embodiments, different droplet combinations are produced through different print head/substrate scan offsets, offsets between print heads, the use of different nozzle drive waveforms, and/or other techniques. Optionally, patterns of fill variation can be introduced so as to mitigate observable line effects in a finished display device. The disclosed techniques have many other possible applications.

A droplet measurement system (DMS) is used in concern with an industrial printer used to fabricate a thin film layer of a flat panel electronic device. A clear tape serves as a printing substrate to receive droplets from hundreds of nozzles simultaneously, while an optics system photographs the deposited droplets through the tape (i.e., through a side opposite the printhead). This permits immediate image analysis of deposited droplets, for parameters such as per-nozzle volume, landing position and other characteristics, without having to substantially reposition the DMS or printhead. The tape can then be advanced and used for a new measurement. By providing such a high degree of concurrency, the described system permits rapid measurement and update of droplet parameters for printers that use hundreds or thousands of nozzles, to provide a real-time understanding of per-nozzle expected droplet parameters, in a manner that can be factored into print planning.

An ink printing process employs per-nozzle droplet volume measurement and processing software that plans droplet combinations to reach specific aggregate ink fills per target region, guaranteeing compliance with minimum and maximum ink fills set by specification. In various embodiments, different droplet combinations are produced through different printhead/substrate scan offsets, offsets between printheads, the use of different nozzle drive waveforms, and/or other techniques. These combinations can be based on repeated, rapid droplet measurements that develop understandings for each nozzle of means and spreads for expected droplet volume, velocity and trajectory, with combinations of droplets being planned based on these statistical parameters. Optionally, random fill variation can be introduced so as to mitigate Mura effects in a finished display device. The disclosed techniques have many possible applications.

An image forming apparatus for forming an image with a coloring material on a recording medium includes a region specifier that specifies a region that becomes a margin when the image is formed on the recording medium; and a pattern image generator that generates image data of a pattern image to be formed in the region based on a size of the region and a type of the coloring material.

A method and apparatus for collecting sample data from a liquid droplet dispensation system is provided.

A driving pulse to be applied to a plurality of print elements in a print element array is decided based on the deviation of the discharge amount from the print elements.

A driving waveform determining method with which a waveform of a driving pulse applied to a driving element provided in a liquid ejecting head that ejects a liquid is determined includes: a first step of measuring, by performing a simulation, ejection characteristics of the liquid from the liquid ejecting head when a waveform candidate is used for the driving pulse; a second step of measuring, by performing an actual measurement, the ejection characteristics of the liquid from the liquid ejecting head when the waveform candidate is used for the driving pulse; and a third step of determining the waveform of the driving pulse in accordance with a measurement result obtained in the first step and a measurement result obtained in the second step.