US Patent 7545544 Image reading apparatus and image forming apparatus

The present invention provides an image reading apparatus including: a document feeding unit that feeds a document along a feeding path; a read-out sensor that reads out an image from the document fed by the document feeding unit without stopping the feed; a control unit that causes the read-out sensor to stay on standby in a predetermined retracted position at a distance from the feeding path when it is not necessary to read out the image of the document, and causes the read-out sensor, when it is necessary to read out the image of the document, to move to a predetermined document reading position and to read out the image from the fed document; and an output unit that outputs the image data read out by the read-out sensor.