Patent ID: 8462253

Claim:
An apparatus comprising: a controller unit adapted to access photographic data, the photographic data including a panorama picture; and a compression unit, coupled to the controller unit, adapted to compress the photographic data, to produce compressed picture data, wherein the controller unit stores, in a storage unit, one of a source picture including a plurality of still frame pictures photographed in a plurality of photographing directions within a predetermined coverage area and a picture which is obtained by compressing the source picture, and displays, on a picture display unit, a whole panorama picture generated from the one of the source picture and the compressed picture, wherein the controller unit indicates an arbitrary point from either the photographic data or the compressed picture data, and only a still frame picture at the indicated arbitrary point is read from one of the source picture and the compressed picture stored in the storage unit, and wherein the read still frame picture is displayed on the picture display unit at a predetermined position thereof, wherein when the still frame picture at the indicated arbitrary point is read, date and time of recorded data of one of the photographic data and the compressed picture data, stored in the storage unit, with which a reading operation starts are designated, the controller unit successively reads the photographic data or the compressed picture data in a sequence from the picture with the designated date and time to older pictures, and a still frame picture at the indicated arbitrary point is read from one of the photographic data and the compressed picture data each time one of the photographic data and the compressed picture data is read.