Patent ID: 7974478

Claim:
A method, comprising: storing an image comprising a set of digital pixels having an original arrangement of rows and columns over an address space in an electronic memory; retrieving the digital pixels from the electronic memory; grouping at least some of the digital pixels in the set into first pixel subsets such that at least some of the first pixel subsets include non-contiguously-arranged pixels with regard to the original arrangement, wherein a statistical distribution of the digital pixels within each first pixel subset is less random as compared to a statistical distribution for the set of digital pixels; dividing at least a portion of the address space into first address segments, each first address segment uniquely identifying a corresponding first pixel subset; ordering the first address segments according to their predictive similarity to provide a coding order; successively retrieving the first pixel subsets corresponding to the ordering of the first address segments; and predictive encoding the successively retrieved first pixel subsets into first encoded symbols.