A halftone dot image HI composed of halftone dots is produced by halftone
dot meshing of an object image OI. A smoothed object image SOI and a
smoothed halftone dot image SHI are then produced by smoothing the object
image and the halftone dot image. An interference moire image IM is
produced by obtaining a difference between the smoothed object image SOI
and the smoothed halftone dot image SHI.