IMAGE PROCESSING METHOD AND APPARATUS WHICH ORDERS TEXT AREAS WHICH HAVE BEEN EXTRACTED FROM AN IMAGE

An apparatus and method for automatically determining the order of reading a plurality of text areas, when an original constituted of the plurality of text areas is input as an image. For this purpose, the structure of text areas is analyzed hierarchically by dividing text areas into groups (plural text areas constituting one article) in consideration of the positional relation of the text areas with a separator, a figure and text areas, rather than simply ordering from top to bottom, so as to also cope with a complex layout such as a newspaper. Also, the connectivity of text areas is judged by making use of information, such as the text contents of the text areas or a connection mark in the text.