Patent ID: 7203341

Claim:
A method of generating and storing picture data representing a traffic scene in a compressed and decompressed format in a data storing memory of a traffic monitoring arrangement having a digital camera, said method comprising the steps of: generating a picture of a traffic scene by means of said digital camera of the traffic monitoring arrangement, so as to generate uncompressed picture data representing said traffic scene; dividing said uncompressed picture data of the traffic scene into a plurality of data segments, so as to designate in said uncompressed picture data a location of at least one area of the traffic scene as a compression segment and a location of at least one other designated area of the traffic scene as a minimal or non-compression segment; storing said uncompressed picture data including the designated traffic scene and compression information for each said designated area in the data storing memory of the traffic monitoring arrangement; selectively compressing said compression and non-compression data segments to a different degree of compression in such a manner that some of said segments are not being compressed, some of said segments are being slightly compressed, and some of said segments are being heavily compressed; and selecting said at least one compression data segment using said location information of the traffic scene and decompressing only said at least one compression data segment representing said one designated area of the traffic scene, while discriminating against said at least one minimal or non-compression data segment representing said other designated area of the traffic scene.