Picture scanning and recording method

Claim 1

A picture scanning and recording method including photoelectrically scanning an original picture, which contains picture patterns of continuous tone in combination with line pictures such as characters or graphics, providing two types of image-detecting photoelectric means in order to record reproduced halftone images for the picture patterns and reproduced line picture images of high resolution for the line pictures respectively, and outputting two types of picture signals to the recording side, which comprises: designating in advance, in the original picture, picture pattern regions to be reproduced as the halftone images, line picture regions to be reproduced as the line picture images and border regions surrounding the respective picture pattern regions respectively with the coordinate values of representative points in the respective regions; setting in advance line picture tint data and border tint data, which are required to record desired tint patterns corresponding respectively to the line picture regions and border regions, for the line picture regions and border regions respectively; upon photoelectrically scanning the original picture, selecting picture signals corresponding to the scanned regions on the basis of the coordinate values of each scanning point and the coordinate values of the representative points in the respective regions, and outputting the thus-selected picture signals to the recording side; and at the same time, at an area where two or more of the designated picture regions are overlapped, selecting picture signals having higher preference on the basis of a preset order of preference.