A data compression system separates input data into color planes prior to compression. If needed for legacy game consoles, compression is performed by a game cartridge transparent to the console. To minimize the number of passes required of a coder/decoder, color planes are ordered by density and the densest color plane is coded first. After the first color plane is coded, other color planes are coded, but pixels which are known to have colors from previously coded color planes are not coded. The last color plane is not coded, but is deduced from all the other color planes. Alternatively, pixel color values are represented by vectors with components thereof separately coded by subcolor planes. Also, each color plane can be coded until a threshold number of pixels are coded, and the remaining pixels coded by bit plane. The image data could be coded using pixel position information as context.
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