A verification apparatus includes a reading unit configured to read an image of a conveyed sheet. The apparatus obtains a reference image for verification of a sheet, and extracts, from the reference image, feature points to be used for alignment of an image with the reference image. The apparatus aligns, with the reference image, a read image obtained by reading an image of a verification target sheet by the reading unit, and verifies the read image by comparing the aligned read image with the reference image. Based on a number of the feature points extracted from the reference image the alignment is performed using positions of the feature points or using positions of sheet vertices each indicating a corner of the sheet.

An image forming apparatus includes a document tray in which a document is to be set, a medium container that contains a recording medium, a document detection sensor that detects a document set in the document tray, a medium detection sensor that detects a recording medium contained in the medium container. A hardware processor executes a copy operation of forming an image obtained by scanning a document set in the document tray on a recording medium, determines to automatically execute the copy operation in case an elapsed period of time between a document detection time when a document is detected by the document detection sensor and a medium detection time when a recording medium is detected by the medium detection sensor is equal to or smaller than a predetermined operation period of time, and automatically executes the copy operation based on determination of automatic execution of the copy operation.

Provided are systems and methods for identifying, isolating, and/or aligning sheets. An identification system can facilitate accurate identification of a sheet by (i) vacating one or more components of the system that are not the sheet from a zone of detection, and/or (ii) determining a reference axis of the sheet. An isolation system can facilitate accurate isolation of a sheet by (i) providing targeted air flow, and/or (ii) introducing a wave into the sheet. Identification systems and/or isolation systems described herein may facilitate isolation of sheets that were previously fastened together by one or more fasteners. An alignment system can facilitate accurate alignment of a first sheet at an upstream location relative to a second sheet at a downstream location via machine learning.

An image forming apparatus includes an image reading unit. When printing a postcard is selected, a preview screen including a preview image about an image on a communication side of the postcard read by the image reacting unit is displayed on a display. At this occasion, an instruction image indicating an orientation of an address side of the postcard is also displayed. When it is instructed to turn over the preview image on the communication side, the preview screen including the preview image on the address side is displayed on the display. When the orientation of the address side and the orientation of the communication side do not coincide with each other, or when they are not as intended by a user, printing is performed after the image on the communication side is rotated according to the user's operation.

A printer for printing on a long sheet includes a print data divider and a verification processor. The print data divider outputs a plurality of segments of divided print data divided at the boundary of areas from standard print data containing print contents in each of the areas obtained by dividing a standard sheet into a plurality of the areas. The verification processor compares the size of the long sheet with the size of the area included in the standard sheet and rotates the divided print data if it is determined from a result of the comparison that the rotation is necessary.

An image processing apparatus includes a platen, a fixed-document detection unit, a determination unit, and a processing-target selection unit. The determination unit determines whether the document on the platen is a left document or not when the document on the document tray and the document on the platen are detected, upon acceptance of the document-reading-starting instruction by the instruction accepting unit. The processing-target selection unit sets image data obtained by a conveyed-document reading unit as a processing target when the determination unit determines that the document on the platen is the left document, and inquires which image data obtained by the conveyed-document reading unit and a fixed-document reading unit, to be set as the processing target of the user when the determination unit determines that the document on the platen is not the left document.

The present disclosure provides a technique to obtain a tilt state occurring between an image capturing unit and a print image having additional information embedded in it without using the visible image. In the technique, an image of a print image in which additional information having a specified frequency characteristic is embedded is captured using an image capturing unit to obtain captured image data. A frequency analysis is performed on partial image data corresponding to a specified area in the obtained captured image data, to obtain distance information on a distance between the specified area and the image capturing unit. Inclination information indicating a state of a relative inclination between the image capturing unit and the print image is obtained based on this distance.

An image forming apparatus includes an image forming unit configured to form a predetermined pattern image on a sheet, a notifying unit configured to provide a notification of an orientation for placing the sheet on which the predetermined pattern image is formed by the image forming unit, on a placement portion, a reading unit configured to read the sheet on a line to line basis, to generate image data, and a detection unit configured to detect a streak-shaped image extending in a direction along a predetermined edge of the sheet, by analyzing the image data generated by reading the sheet by the reading unit, wherein the notifying unit provides a notification of a placement orientation for allowing the sheet, on which the predetermined pattern image is formed, to be read on a line to line basis, the line extending in a direction along the predetermined edge.

According to an automatic document feeder of a multifunction peripheral according to the present invention, two tilt sensors are provided in the middle of a document conveyance path to detect a tilt degree of a document being conveyed along the document conveyance path. Here, for example, if the positional deviation representing the tilt degree of the document is greater than a predetermined threshold value ΔLs, the conveyance of the document is stopped. On the other hand, if this is not the case, the conveyance of the document is continued. In addition, the threshold value is set in accordance with the width dimension of the document, and in particular, the larger the width dimension, the smaller the threshold value.

A document reading device includes a reading section, an orientation detecting section, an orientation determining section, and a notification section. The reading section reads images of respective pages of a spread document one at a time. The orientation detecting section sequentially detects orientations of respective images read by the reading section. The orientation determining section determines whether or not the orientation detecting section detects orientation alternation between a first orientation and a second orientation opposite to the first orientation for a read image read by the reading section. The notification section notifies an error upon the orientation determining section determining that the orientation detecting section does not detect orientation alternation between the first orientation and the second orientation.