BACKGROUND OF THE DISCLOSURE

Field of the Disclosure

The aspect of the embodiments disclosure relates to a color adjustment technique in a printer that prints digital image data.

Description of the Related Art

Digital image data created by using an application on a PC (Personal Computer) is sent to a printer via a network and converted into print data within the printer and subjected to printing processing. Normally, digital image data includes three color components of red (R), green (G), and blue (B). Then, print data includes color components corresponding to four kinds of color material used by a printer, that is, four color components of cyan (C), magenta (M), yellow (Y), and black (K). Consequently, within a printer, it is necessary to convert a color represented by RGB into a color represented by CMYK and at this time, generally, color conversion is performed so that the color becomes close to the tint in the digital image data displayed on a monitor of the PC.

In a use, such as a so-called POP advertisement, for an arbitrary adjustment-target color (for example, corporate color or the like) on a digital image, special color conversion to convert the color into an aimed color (destination color) specified by a user is required in place of the general color conversion to match the color with the tint of a monitor described above. Hereinafter, this color conversion is called “special color conversion”. In performing this special color conversion, there is a case where a color sample is used in order to cause a user to specify a destination color for an adjustment-target color. The user prints the color sample in which color patches correspond to each of a plurality of colors, which are destination color candidates, are arranged and specifies a destination color by referring to the scanned image thereof to select a color patch having a desired color. At the time of printing of this color sample, the tone characteristic of a printer is to be in the standard state in order to guarantee the tint.

Further, for example, at the time of purchase of a new printer, there is a case where it is desired to perform the special color conversion that has been performed by the old printer before the purchase also by the newly purchased printer. At this time, it is considered to set a destination color in the new printer by using the output results by the old printer as a color sample, and at this time, the tone characteristic of the old printer is to be in the standard state in order to guarantee the tint of the destination color.

Normally, the tone characteristic of a printer enters the standard state by performing tone calibration and it is made possible to guarantee the tint in the printing results. In this regard, Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2005-343066 has described a technique to notify a user of the necessity of tone calibration in a case where it is necessary by determining whether or not tone calibration is necessary before performing printing processing for digital image data. In a case of this technique, a user is prompted to perform tone calibration, and therefore, whether tone calibration is performed actually depends on the user's will. That is, this technique does not guarantee that the tone characteristic is in the standard state at the time of printing. Even by performing printing of the color sample described above in the state where the tone characteristic deviates from the standard state, appropriate results are not obtained, and therefore, in that meaning, the technique of Japanese Patent Laid-Open No 2005-343066 described above cannot be said to be sufficient.

SUMMARY OF THE DISCLOSURE

An apparatus that controls a processing unit configured to generate print data that can be processed by a printing unit by performing predetermined image processing for printing-target image data; and the printing unit, and includes: a control unit configured to: cause the printing unit to perform calibration in response to reception of instructions to print a color sample from a user; cause, after the calibration is completed, the processing unit to perform a predetermined image processing on image data representing a color sample; and cause the printing unit to perform printing processing of the image data subjected to the predetermined image processing.

Further features of the disclosure will become apparent from the following description of exemplary embodiments with reference to the attached drawings.

