PRINTING APPARATUS, PRINTING METHOD, AND PRINTING SYSTEM

• US 20200034674A1
• Filed: 07/23/2019
• Published: 01/30/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 07/25/2018
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Seiko Epson Corporation (Seiko Group)
• Original Assignee: Seiko Epson Corporation (Seiko Group)
• Inventors: HAYASHI, Tadashi
• Granted Patent: US 10,650,293 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/1215 achieving increased printing speed, i.e. reducing the time between printing start and printing end
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/1244 Job translation or job parsing, e.g. page banding
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/126 Job scheduling, e.g. queuing, determine appropriate device
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/1292 Mobile client, e.g. wireless printing
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 15/1801 Input data handling means
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 15/1835 Transforming generic data
• CPC Class Codes: H03M 7/3088 employing the use of a dictionary, e.g. LZ78
• CPC Class Codes: H03M 7/40 Conversion to or from variable length codes, e.g. Shannon-Fano code, Huffman code, Morse code
• CPC Class Codes: H03M 7/6023 Parallelization

Abstract

A printing apparatus includes an obtaining section that obtains encoded data in which compression is performed, a decoding section that decodes encoded data to obtain image data for printing, and a printing section that performs printing by using image data for printing. The encoded data is encoded data including, for a respective one of the blocks, first compressed data in which quantized values obtained by performing orthogonal transformation for a respective one of N color components are each compressed, and second compressed data in which, by using a dictionary in which a plurality of different colors are registered as indexes, a corresponding one of the indexes associated with the color of each pixel is compressed. The decoding section decodes the first compressed data in N cycles and decodes the second compressed data in one cycle to obtain print data decoded in units of the blocks.

Claims

1. A printing apparatus that prints an image, comprising:

at least one obtaining section that divides the image into a plurality of blocks of a plurality of pixels and obtains encoded data in which compression is performed in units of the blocks;

at least one decoding section that decodes the obtained encoded data in units of the blocks to obtain image data for printing; and

a printing section that performs printing by using the obtained image data for printing,

wherein

the encoded data is encoded data including, for a respective one of the blocks, first compressed data in which quantized values obtained by quantizing frequency components obtained by performing orthogonal transformation for a respective one of N color components, N being an integer of two or more, are respectively compressed by variable length codes, and second compressed data in which, by using a dictionary in which a plurality of different colors are registered as indexes, a corresponding one of the indexes associated with a color of each pixel is compressed by a variable length code, and

the at least one decoding section decodes, among the obtained encoded data, the first compressed data in N cycles and decodes the second compressed data in one cycle by referencing the dictionary to obtain print data decoded in units of the blocks.

2. The printing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the at least one decoding section further performs inverse orthogonal transformation and inverse quantization.

3. The printing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein N is three.

4. The printing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein

the at least one obtaining section and the at least one decoding section respectively include S obtaining sections and S decoding sections associated with each other, S being an integer of two or more,

a respective one of the S obtaining sections sequentially obtains, in a printing direction, the encoded data in a unit of a band that is in a unit of rasters the number of which corresponds to the number of pixels of M blocks among the blocks in the printing direction of the image, M being a natural number,

a respective one of the S decoding sections decodes the encoded data obtained by the rasters by an associated one of the S obtaining sections, and

the printing section sequentially prints, in the printing direction, the decoded print data from each of the decoding sections.

5. The printing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein

the at least one obtaining section and the at least one decoding section respectively include S obtaining sections and S decoding sections associated with each other, S being an integer of two or more,

a respective one of the S obtaining sections sequentially obtains, in a printing direction, the encoded data in a unit of a band that is in a unit of rasters the number of which corresponds to the number of pixels of M blocks among the blocks in the printing direction of the image, M being a natural number,

a respective one of the S decoding sections decodes the encoded data by the rasters obtained by an associated one of the S obtaining sections,

the printing section sequentially prints, in the printing direction, the decoded print data from each of the decoding sections, and

the at least one decoding section sets an offset to a head address of the decoded print data in accordance with a size of the rasters.

6. A printing method performed by a printing apparatus that prints an image, comprising:

dividing the image into a plurality of blocks of a plurality of pixels and obtaining encoded data in which compression is performed in units of the blocks;

decoding the obtained encoded data in units of the blocks to obtain image data for printing; and

performing printing by using the obtained image data for printing,

wherein

the encoded data is encoded data including, for a respective one of the blocks, first compressed data in which quantized values obtained by quantizing frequency components obtained by performing orthogonal transformation for a respective one of N color components, N being an integer of two or more, are respectively compressed by variable length codes, and second compressed data in which, by using a dictionary in which a plurality of different colors are registered as indexes, a corresponding one of the indexes associated with a color of each pixel is compressed by a variable length code, and

the decoding decodes, among the obtained encoded data, the first compressed data in N cycles and decodes the second compressed data in one cycle by referencing the dictionary to obtain print data decoded in units of the blocks.

7. A printing system comprising:

an encoding apparatus that compresses image data of an image into encoded data; and

a printing apparatus that obtains the encoded data from the encoding apparatus, decodes the encoded data into print data, and prints the print data,

wherein

the encoding apparatus

divides the image into a plurality of blocks of a plurality of pixels and generates the encoded data as encoded data including, for a respective one of the blocks, first compressed data in which quantized values obtained by quantizing frequency components obtained by performing orthogonal transformation for a respective one of N color components, N being an integer of two or more, are respectively compressed by variable length codes, and second compressed data in which, by using a dictionary in which a plurality of different colors are registered as indexes, a corresponding one of the indexes associated with a color of each pixel is compressed by a variable length code, and

the printing apparatus includes

an obtaining section that obtains the encoded data,

a decoding section that decodes, among the obtained encoded data, the first compressed data in N cycles and decodes the second compressed data in one cycle by referencing the dictionary to obtain image data for printing in units of the blocks, and

a printing section that performs printing by using the obtained image data for printing.