Method and apparatus for compressing a sequence of information-bearing frames having at least two media

A method of representing a sequence of visual information-bearing frames having a closed-caption component representing textual information associated therewith, said method comprising the steps of:

• dividing the sequence of frames and closed-caption component into a plurality of segments;
• retaining a representative frame from each segment;
• retaining the closed-caption component of each segment;
• and
• recording the representative frame and the closed-caption component for each segment.

A method of compressing a sequence of visual information-bearing frames having an audio component associated therewith, said method comprising the steps of:

• dividing the sequence of frames and associated audio component into a plurality of segments;
• retaining a representative frame from each segment;
• retaining the audio component of each segment;
• and
• recording each representative frame and the audio component segment associated therewith.

An apparatus for representing a sequence of frames having at least first and second information-bearing media components, in which said first and second information-bearing media components are different from one another, said apparatus comprising;

• means for selecting a plurality of representative frames representing information contained in the first information-bearing media component;
• means for forming a correspondence between each of the representative frames and one of a plurality of segments of the second information-bearing media component;
• and
• means for recording said representative frames, said plurality of segments of the second information-bearing media component and thecorrespondence therebetween.