A method, including: - providing at least one set of image data, - composing an image data stream including compressed image data from the at least one set of image data having embedded therein a respective image frame counter identificative of the set of image data by lossless encoding the respective image frame counter in the compressed image data, wherein composing said image data stream comprises: - writing one or more instances of said respective image frame counter identificative of the set of image data at locations determined by a map in said at least one set of image data, - encoding to a compressed format said at least one set of image data with macroblock-based encoding, wherein macroblock regions embedding said one or more instances of said respective image frame counter are selectively encoded in a lossless manner, and macroblock regions not embedding said one or more instances of said respective image frame counter are selectively encoded in a lossy manner, and - embedding said one or more instances of said respective image frame counter into macroblock regions exempt from in-loop de-blocking processing, wherein said macroblock regions exempt from in-loop de-blocking processing comprise inner regions of I PCM luma macroblocks and inner regions of I_PCM chroma macroblocks, said inner regions not being processed by in-loop de-blocking filtering when coded using I_PCM macroblocks, - transmitting (13, 30, 21) the composed image data stream over a transmission channel, and - receiving the transmitted composed image data stream and recovering therefrom (26, 2010) the lossless encoded image frame counter. - providing at least one set of image data, - composing an image data stream including compressed image data from the at least one set of image data having embedded therein a respective image frame counter identificative of the set of image data by lossless encoding the respective image frame counter in the compressed image data, wherein composing said image data stream comprises: - writing one or more instances of said respective image frame counter identificative of the set of image data at locations determined by a map in said at least one set of image data, - encoding to a compressed format said at least one set of image data with macroblock-based encoding, wherein macroblock regions embedding said one or more instances of said respective image frame counter are selectively encoded in a lossless manner, and macroblock regions not embedding said one or more instances of said respective image frame counter are selectively encoded in a lossy manner, and - embedding said one or more instances of said respective image frame counter into macroblock regions exempt from in-loop de-blocking processing, wherein said macroblock regions exempt from in-loop de-blocking processing comprise inner regions of I PCM luma macroblocks and inner regions of I_PCM chroma macroblocks, said inner regions not being processed by in-loop de-blocking filtering when coded using I_PCM macroblocks, - writing one or more instances of said respective image frame counter identificative of the set of image data at locations determined by a map in said at least one set of image data, - encoding to a compressed format said at least one set of image data with macroblock-based encoding, wherein macroblock regions embedding said one or more instances of said respective image frame counter are selectively encoded in a lossless manner, and macroblock regions not embedding said one or more instances of said respective image frame counter are selectively encoded in a lossy manner, and - embedding said one or more instances of said respective image frame counter into macroblock regions exempt from in-loop de-blocking processing, wherein said macroblock regions exempt from in-loop de-blocking processing comprise inner regions of I PCM luma macroblocks and inner regions of I_PCM chroma macroblocks, said inner regions not being processed by in-loop de-blocking filtering when coded using I_PCM macroblocks, - transmitting (13, 30, 21) the composed image data stream over a transmission channel, and - receiving the transmitted composed image data stream and recovering therefrom (26, 2010) the lossless encoded image frame counter.