IMAGE PROCESSING APPARATUS AND METHOD FOR REDUCING COLORING BETWEEN COLOR INK AND CLEAR INK ON A PIXEL REGION

An image processing apparatus includes a conversion unit and a determination unit to convert image data into color material data including color material data indicating a color material amount of a chromatic color material and color material data indicating a color material amount of an achromatic color material. The conversion unit converts image data of a region of interest in an image into the color material data of the chromatic color material. The determination unit determines the color material data of the achromatic color material corresponding to the image data so that a color indicated by coloring information corresponding to the image data of the region of interest in the image approaches an achromatic color.