Patent application number | Description | Published |
20090273472 | APPARATUS, SYSTEM, AND METHOD FOR SAFELY AND SECURELY STORING MATERIALS - An apparatus, system, and method are disclosed for safely and securely storing materials. A plurality of smart tiles sense traffic and generate traffic data. A network transmits the traffic data from the smart tiles. A computer determines a plurality of normal traffic patterns from the traffic data. In addition, the computer detects an abnormal traffic pattern from the traffic data. The computer activates a security response in response to the abnormal traffic pattern. | 11-05-2009 |
20090279112 | Ink minimizing profile making tool - An International Color Consortium (ICC) profile making tool includes a regression module to establish a dependency between a profile connection space (PCS) and a device color space and an optimization module to generate a first output profile based on an ink minimization mode and a second output profile based on a high accuracy mode. | 11-12-2009 |
20090279142 | Mechanism for K-only object rendering in a high-speed color controller - Embodiments of the invention disclose a method for K-only (gray/black) object rendering in a high-speed color controller of a printing system. The method includes setting a flag to indicate selection of a K-only text and barcode print preference from a user of a print system, receiving one or more objects to be printed by the print system, the one or more objects including at least one of a text object and a barcode object, determining whether an input color space for the at least one text object and barcode object should be converted to K-only black ink, and rendering the at least one of the text object and the barcode object as K-only black ink if the input color space is determined to be converted to K-only black ink. | 11-12-2009 |
20090322808 | Method and apparatus for determining real time ink volume in a printer - A method is disclosed. The method includes measuring a first mass of an ink container supported by a printer support device, converting the first mass to a first volume, printing a first print job, measuring a second mass of the ink container after printing the first print job and converting the second mass to a second volume. | 12-31-2009 |
20100045722 | CORRECTION OF PRINT ENGINE ARTIFACTS USING AN ITERATIVE HALFTONING SEARCH ALGORITHM - Methods and systems herein provide for reducing artifacts during printing. One printing system is operable to prepare a continuous tone image (CTI) for printing onto a print medium by generating an initial half tone image (HTI) based on the CTI. The printing system includes a printer and a print controller. The print controller filters the initial HTI and the CTI with a perceptual filter and determines an error between the filtered CTI and the filtered HTI. The print controller prints the HTI via the printer to determine printer artifacts and processes a scanned version of the printed HTI to determine an error between the filtered CTI and the scanned and filtered HTI. This processing updates the initial HTI and reduces the error between the filtered CTI and the filtered HTI. | 02-25-2010 |
20100053245 | High speed dual pass ink jet printer - A method is disclosed. The method includes performing a first print pass to print a first data point on a medium using a first set of ink jet nozzles and performing a second print pass to print the first data point on the medium with a second set of ink jet nozzles. | 03-04-2010 |
20100172664 | ADJUSTING ELECTROSTATIC CHARGES USED IN A LASER PRINTER - Provided are a method, system, and article of manufacture for adjusting electrostatic charges used in a laser printer. A charge is applied to a surface of a photoconductor drum to create a dark voltage. An image area of the photoconductor drum is exposed with a printhead using a defined energy level to discharge the charge from the image area. An exposure voltage of the photoconductor drum is measured after the image area has been exposed by the printhead. A first optimization is performed to determine an adjusted dark voltage and an adjusted energy level based on the measured exposure voltage and the dark voltage and the energy levels applied to the photoconductor drum. An applicator voltage is applied to an applicator that applies toner to the exposed image area of the photoconductor drum. Toner density of the toner applied to the photoconductor drum is measured and a second optimization is performed to adjust the applicator voltage to produce a target toner density. | 07-08-2010 |
20110063633 | COLOR PRINTER CALIBRATION FOR MULTIPLE MEDIUMS - Methods and systems herein provide for calibrating for a plurality of different paper types. In one embodiment, a system for calibrating a printer includes a measurement module operable to detect colors printed on a first tangible medium by the printer and convert the detected colors to a detected color characterization. The system also includes a storage module operable to store a calibration file. The calibration file includes color characterizations of a plurality of different tangible mediums and each color characterization includes color measurements for one of the plurality of different tangible mediums obtained from the printer via the measurement module when the printer is calibrated. The system also includes a calibration module operable to compare the detected color characterization to at least two color characterizations of the calibration file and determine an adjustment to an output color scheme of the printer based on the comparison to calibrate the printer. | 03-17-2011 |
20110075163 | SYSTEMS AND METHODS OF COLOR CONVERSION WITH GRAY VALUES - Methods and systems herein provide for the color conversion of image data with various levels of gray values, such as text. Such color conversion includes generating a CMYK conversion model by defining a gray region in the perceptual color space of the image data to convert the gray values of the gray region to a range of K values during CMYK color conversion of the image data and segmenting chroma values in a color lookup table that maps perceptual color values to CMYK color values. Lightness values in the color lookup table are adjusted using a perceptual model (e.g., a Heimholtz-Kohlrausch Effect model) based on the segmented chroma values to substantially maintain a lightness relationship between the gray values of the image data and the remaining color values of the image data. The image data is the converted to a CMYK color space using the generated CMYK conversion model. | 03-31-2011 |
20110134486 | Mechanism for Integration of Print Quality Enhancement (PQE) and Multi-Bit Halftone Data - A mechanism for integrating print quality enhancement (PQE) and multi-bit halftone data is disclosed. A system of embodiments of the invention includes a print control unit communicably coupled to a printer, the print control unit operable to process received multi-bit input print data for printing by the printer;\. The system further comprises a PQE card communicably coupled with the printer, the PQE card configured to separate multi-bit text and line art input data from multi-bit halftone image input data in the multi-bit input print data, ignore any of the identified multi-bit halftone image input data for purposes of applying PQE technology to the identified multi-bit halftone image input data, and apply the PQE technology to the identified multi-bit text and line art input data. Lastly, the system includes a print head communicably coupled to the printer, the print head operable to print multi-bit output created by the PQE card. | 06-09-2011 |
20110148968 | MULTI-PASS CALIBRATION IN FIXED PRINTHEAD ARRAY PRINTERS - Methods and apparatus herein provide for automated calibration of multiple printheads used in a multi-pass printing system. Aspects hereof print a plurality of gray scale printed patterns each printed pattern corresponding to a gray scale value for each of the multiple printheads. The printed patterns are then measured to determine the intensity (e.g., optical density) of each of the printed patterns. A measurement function is derived from the measured intensity and gray scale levels used to print each pattern. Calibrated transfer functions are then determined from the measurement function and target function where each calibrated transfer function relates, for a corresponding printhead, an input gray scale level of a pixel in an image to be printed to a calibrated gray scale level to use for the corresponding printhead when operating in multi-pass mode. | 06-23-2011 |
20110235944 | DIGITAL IMAGE SCALING WITH NON INTEGER SCALING FACTORS - Non integer scaling of images to reduce artifacts is presented herein. One embodiment includes determining a scaling resolution based on a pixel resolution of the image and a pixel resolution of an output device (i.e., factors of the scaling resolution). The image is converted to the scaling resolution to change (e.g., increase) the pixels of the image by the first factor. A grid is generated to scale the converted image. The grid has a number of sections defined according to the second factor times the pixel resolution of an output device. The converted image is sectioned according to the grid. Each section of the grid includes an integer number of pixels of the converted image. The color values of the pixels of the converted image are averaged within each section of the grid to compute a single color value for each section of the grid and scale the image. | 09-29-2011 |
20120206515 | Ink Flow Regulation Mechanism - A method is disclosed. The method includes setting a desired flow rate for ink in an ink jet printer, measuring an actual flow rate of the ink, determining if the measured flow rate is equal to the desired flow rate and adjusting the flow rate if the measured flow rate is not equal to the desired flow rate. | 08-16-2012 |
20120218569 | CMYK COLOR CONVERSION USING ITERATIVE COORDINATE REVISION - Systems and methods for color conversion from one CMYK color space to another CMYK color space. The system receives a color defined by a first coordinate in the first CMYK color space. The system converts the color to a second coordinate for the second CMYK color space, and determines a location in a perceptual color space for each of the first coordinate and the second coordinate. The system further identifies a distance between the locations in the perceptual color space, and reduces the distance in the perceptual color space between the two locations by iteratively revising the second coordinate in the second CMYK color space while holding the black level of the second coordinate constant. | 08-30-2012 |
20120223996 | PRINT DATA COMPENSATION FOR VARIATIONS IN PAPER POSITION WITHIN A PRINTING SYSTEM - Methods and systems herein provide for print data compensation for a print head based on a lateral offset of a media relative to the print head. In one embodiment, a print controller of a printer identifies an edge of a media that is parallel to a direction of travel of the media, and determines a lateral offset between the edge of the media and a print head of the printer. The print controller then modifies data for the print head based on the lateral offset to compensate for a lateral motion of the media relative to the print head. | 09-06-2012 |
20120287196 | DYNAMIC DRYER CONTROL IN PRINTING - Embodiments described herein provide variable heat control for a printer. One system includes a dryer operable to dry ink applied to a print medium. The system also includes a controller communicatively coupled to the dryer and operable to filter a bitmap to provide variable heat control from the dryer to the applied ink according to the bitmap to attach the ink to the print medium. The print medium may be a continuous form print medium. In this regard, the controller maybe operable to determine a speed at which the continuous form print medium is moving, to generate a heat control signal operable to provide the variable heat control, and to delay transmission of the heat control signal based on the determined speed of the continuous form print medium until the ink applied to the continuous form print medium is within range of the dryer. | 11-15-2012 |
20130003092 | ESTIMATION OF INK/TONER COVERAGE WHEN PRINTING - In summary, the present invention provides a method, apparatus and program product for calculating an estimate of the amount of toner coverage required for printing print data defined in a compressed data stream. The estimate is obtained with reduced processing by obtaining coverage data from a partially decompressed formed of the data stream and using this to obtain the coverage estimate, thus removing the need to do a full de-compression of the data stream. For example the coverage data is a count of toned pixels for at least one intensity level. | 01-03-2013 |
20130003093 | ESTIMATION OF INK/TONER COVERAGE WHEN PRINTING - In summary, the present invention provides a method, apparatus and program product for calculating an estimate of the amount of toner coverage required for printing print data defined in a compressed data stream. The estimate is obtained with reduced processing by obtaining coverage data from a partially decompressed formed of the data stream and using this to obtain the coverage estimate, thus removing the need to do a full de-compression of the data stream. For example the coverage data is a count of toned pixels for at least one intensity level. | 01-03-2013 |
20130016370 | FORCE K PROCESSING IN A CMYK COLOR CONVERSIONAANM Shestak; Vladimir V.AACI Fort CollinsAAST COAACO USAAGP Shestak; Vladimir V. Fort Collins CO USAANM Ernst; Larry M.AACI LongmontAAST COAACO USAAGP Ernst; Larry M. Longmont CO USAANM Li; HongAACI SuperiorAAST COAACO USAAGP Li; Hong Superior CO USAANM Walp; Jason C.AACI LouisvilleAAST COAACO USAAGP Walp; Jason C. Louisville CO US - Force K processing is presented to replace gray color values of input data with only levels of black ink/toner when color management is not specified in the print job. A system converts input data of a print job to a CMYK color space of a printer by processing a lookup table of color values for the color space of the input data based on a detected color space of the input data to identify gray color values of the lookup table. The system also determines that these gray color values produce an output in the CMYK color space of the printer that includes one or more of cyan, magenta, and yellow color components. The system replaces the gray color values with black color values and corresponds the black color values of the lookup table with gray color values of the input data for conversion of the input data. | 01-17-2013 |
20130257969 | Print Head Alignment Mechanism - A printing system is disclosed. The printing system includes a print engine including two or more print heads to generate an alignment chart and an alignment system. The alignment system receives the alignment chart and computes a magnitude of misalignment between the print heads. | 10-03-2013 |
20130265360 | Defective Nozzle Detection Mechanism - A method is disclosed. The method includes receiving image data from one or more image readers and analyzing the image data to locate and classify artifacts on the medium caused by defective print engine nozzles. | 10-10-2013 |
20140204136 | CONTROL OF INK TEMPERATURES FOR RADIANT DRYING - Systems and methods for tuning Key (K) black ink printed by a production printer. In one embodiment, an ink tuning system is implemented in a printing system. The printing system includes a production printer that is operable to print color ink onto a continuous-form medium, and includes a radiant dryer that is operable to dry the ink that is applied to the medium. The ink tuning system identifies areas of K black ink designated for printing on the medium by the production printer, and applies a liquid agent to the areas of K black ink to increase the liquid mass of the K black ink before the medium enters the radiant dryer. | 07-24-2014 |
20150022829 | Image Scaling Mechanism - A method is disclosed. The method includes receiving an image, upsampling the image, eroding the upsampled image to compensate for dot gain and scaling the eroded image to scale the image to a desired size. | 01-22-2015 |