Patent ID: 7751474

Claim:
An image encoding apparatus comprising: an encoder which performs encoding processing of input Video Object Planes (VOPs) successively, thereby outputting a bit stream; a switch circuit which allows the encoding processing by the encoder to be skipped in a unit of each of the VOPs; an encoding controller which generates an i-th skip signal indicating whether or not the encoding processing of an i-th Video Object Plane (VOP) is to be skipped and outputs the i-th skip signal to the switch circuit, where i is an integer not smaller than 1, the encoding controller generating a control signal for controlling a code amount after the encoding processing of the i-th VOP by the encoder using an i-th scene change signal of the i-th VOP and outputting the control signal to the encoder; and a scene change signal generator which generates the i-th scene change signal to be input to the encoding controller on the basis of information of the i-th VOP and a VOP input prior to the i-th VOP and an (i−1)-th skip signal indicating whether or not the encoding processing of the (i−1)-th VOP input a period of N VOPs before the i-th VOP is skipped, where N is an integer not smaller than 1.