Image compression and expansion technique

1. An image compression device for generating compressed data formed by compressing an image, said image compression device comprising:

a boundary area detection section for detecting boundary areas which include both of internal and external parts of an object rendered in the image, from among plural areas included in the image;

a non-boundary area data generation section for, by compressing non-boundary areas which are not the boundary areas in the image, in a predetermined compression mode, generating partially compressed data in the compressed data, corresponding to the non-boundary areas; and

a boundary area data generation section for generating partially compressed data in the compressed data, corresponding to the boundary areas, from the boundary areas, in a mode in which difference between images before compression and after expansion is less in comparison with a case where the boundary areas are compressed in the predetermined compression mode, wherein the image is a telop image to be displayed in a manner that the telop image is superimposed on a background image, and the object is a telop portion of the telop image,

wherein the image compression device further comprises a transmittance acquisition section for acquiring a transmittance at which the background image is displayed through the telop image, the transmittance being specified for each pixel, and

wherein said boundary area detection section detects each of plural areas included in the telop image as the boundary area if the area includes both of pixels with a transmittance greater than a predetermined first reference transmittance and pixels with a transmittance equal to or smaller than the first reference transmittance.

2. The image compression device according to claim 1 , wherein the transmittance acquisition section acquires a key image in which transmittances of the respective pixels of a telop image, for which transmittances are to be specified, are arranged as brightness values in the same manner as that the pixels of the telop image are arranged, and

wherein said boundary area data generation section further compresses areas in the key image, corresponding to the boundary areas in the telop image, in the same compression mode in which the boundary areas in the telop image are compressed.

3. The image compression device according to claim 1 , further comprising:

an area-not-to-be-rendered determination section which determines, for each of the plural areas included in the telop image, that the area is an area which is not required to be rendered if the transmittances of all pixels included in the area are greater than a second reference transmittance at which the background image transmits more than at the first reference transmittance; and

an area-not-to-be rendered processing section for compressing the image by removing image data indicating the area determined as an area which is not required to be rendered, from the compressed data, and adding information indicating that the rendering of the area is not required to the compressed data.