A printing control method of generating dot data representing a state of dot formation at each pixel in a printed image represented by an given image data, by formation of dots in respective pixels with the at least one colored ink and the quality-enhancing ink available in the print unit. This process includes a processing mode configured to make a quality-enhancing ink dot-recording rate for pixels belonging to a peripheral area lower than the quality-enhancing ink dot-recording rate for pixels belonging to a center area.