An image forming apparatus, having a first photosensitive drum, a first developing roller, a first shifting member movable between a contacting position and a separating position, a motor, a first joint, a first clutch operable in one of a transmittable condition and a discontinuing condition, a first shifting cam rotatable between a first position, in which the first shifting cam locates the first shifting member at the contacting position, and a second position, in which the first shifting cam locates the first shifting member at the separating position, and a first switching cam rotatable between a third position, in which the first switching cam places the first clutch in the transmittable condition, and a fourth position, in which the first switching cam places the first clutch in the discontinuing condition, alongside the first shifting cam rotating between the first position and the second position, is provided.

A method is described in which a first color is detected at a user-selected arbitrary position of a first print; a second color is detected at a user-selected arbitrary position of a second print printed by a printer; a color difference between the first color and the second color is determined; and settings of the printer are changed to reduce the color difference in further prints printed by the printer.

A toner case includes a case main body, a cover, and a coil spring. The case main body is rotatable and has a toner containing space in which a toner is contained and an opening through which the toner is discharged from the toner containing space. The cover keeps a rotation stop state when the case main body rotates and has a communication space which communicates with the toner containing space via the opening. The coil spring is fixed to the cover so that at least a part of the coil spring is arranged in the communication space. The coil spring vibrates as the case main body rotates.

An image forming apparatus is capable of being attached with a toner supply container. The toner supply container stores a toner that is to be supplied to a developing portion. An attachment location of the toner supply container isbelow a light scanning portion in a vertical direction.

In an image forming apparatus, an image forming unit configured to form a toner image on a transfer medium includes four sets of a photoconductor drum and a development roller, respectively, for forming toner images of first, second, third and fourth colors, arranged in this order, in a direction opposite to a direction of movement of the transfer medium moving toward a detector configured to detect a toner image formed on the transfer medium. A controller executes a bias-corrective test image forming process in which a first bias-corrective test image of the first color is arranged in a position downstream of other three first bias-corrective test images, and a second bias-corrective test image of the first color is arranged in a position between two first bias-corrective test images selected among other three first bias-corrective test images, in the direction of movement of the transfer medium.

A method of converting a CMYW toner printer to a CMYK printer that prints with black toner, comprising the steps: providing a CMYW toner printer; wherein the CMYW toner printer has four starting toner printing cartridges; wherein the four starting toner printing cartridges comprise a white toner printing cartridge, a cyan toner printing cartridge, a magenta toner printing cartridge, and a yellow toner printing cartridge; removing one or more of the four starting toner printing cartridges from the CMYW toner printer, such that there are one or more empty toner cartridge slots; providing a black toner printing cartridge that are each filled with black toner; and installing the black toner printing cartridge into the one or more empty toner cartridge slots.

A white toner for electrostatic image development contains white toner particles that contain a binder resin and a white pigment and satisfy condition 1 below:

condition 1: a grain size distribution index GSD.sub.vL of the white toner particles satisfies formula (1) below, and a ratio of a number of white toner particles having a diameter of 3 μm or less to a total number of white toner particles is 1% by number or more and less than 6% by number:

1.2≤GSD.sub.vL(=D.sub.84v/D.sub.50v)≤1.5   formula (1):

(in formula (1), D.sub.84v is a particle diameter at which a cumulative frequency cumulated from a small diameter side in a volume-based particle size distribution is 84%, and D.sub.50v is a particle diameter at which the cumulative frequency cumulated from the small diameter side in the volume-based particle size distribution is 50%).

An image processing apparatus includes a processor configured to: store a first color patch used in using metallic toner and a second color patch used in using CMYK toner other than the metallic toner without using the metallic toner; receive a first colorimetric value obtained by measuring color of the first color patch and a second colorimetric value obtained by measuring color of the second color patch; calculate a third colorimetric value on a basis of the first colorimetric value obtained by measuring the color of the first color patch and the second colorimetric value obtained by measuring the color of the second color patch, and generate a profile to be used to convert an input color value into an output color value, the profile being generated on a basis of the third colorimetric value; and calculate the third colorimetric value that ranges from the first colorimetric value to the second colorimetric value in response to a total amount of CMYK toner being lower than or equal to a threshold, the total amount of the CMYK toner resulting from color conversion of the input color value performed by using the profile, and calculate the third colorimetric value that coincides with the first colorimetric value in response to the total amount exceeding the threshold.

According to one embodiment, a developing device forms a toner image on a photoconductive image carrier with toner supplied from a toner cartridge. A toner supply motor supplies the toner from the toner cartridge to the developing device based on the toner concentration. A processor detects an empty toner based on a toner supply rate, a print rate of the image data, and toner characteristics that are characteristics of the toner supplied from the toner cartridge to the developing device, the toner supply rate being calculated based on a pixel count value that is an integrated value of pixel values of the image data and a toner supply motor count value that is an integrated value of drive times of the toner supply motor.

A coating layer application device (200) for applying a coating layer, which is located on a transfer element, to a substrate, the coating layer (206) being formed from a coating material, in particular a thermosetting coating material, the coating layer (206) being curable and comprising an amorphous material, the coating layer application device comprising: a heating device (214, 220) being configured so as to (i) maintain the temperature of the coating layer (206) within a temperature range before removal of N the transfer element (204) from the coating layer (206), wherein within the temperature range the uncured coating material is in its supercooled liquid state; and/or (ii) partially cure the coating layer (206) during a contact of the coating layer (206) and the substrate (210) and before removal of the transfer element (204) from the coating layer, in particular by increasing the temperature of the coating layer (206) to a temperature at or above a curing temperature of the coating layer (206).