ADAPTIVE CONTOUR CODING METHOD FOR ENCODING A CONTOUR IMAGE IN A VIDEO SIGNAL

A contour coding method adaptively encodes a contour image in a video frame based on the size and complexity of the contour image in order to improve the quality of a reconstructed contour image. First, the size and complexity of the contour image inputted are determined. Simultaneously, the contour image is encoded by using a first and a second contour coding methods to thereby provide first and second coded contour data, respectively. And, the first or the second coded contour data is selected as encoded contour image data based on the size and complexity of the contour image.