Patent ID: 6965698

Claim:
A method for use in lossy compression of image data, the method comprising: compressing each of a plurality of images individually; determining an individual compressibility value for each of the images; identifying a number of image collections each of which includes more than one of the plurality of images; compressing each collection as a whole; determining, for each image in an image collection, a composite compressibility value, which represents the image's compressibility as part of the image collection; and for each image in an image collection, obtaining a ratio based on the image's individual compressibility value and composite compressibility value. selecting more than one image from the plurality of images; and creating a composite image which comprises the selected images, wherein image selection is based at least in part on the obtained ratio, and wherein, for at least one of the selected images, lossy compression of the composite image results in improved compressibility.