The invention is to relax the influence of noise with patch images of a number
as small as possible, in consideration of the correlation of noise. For attaining
this objective, in the preparation of a patch image to be used for generating image
processing data, the patch image is made to include plural patches of a same color
and such plural patches of the same color are so arranged as to reduce the mutual
influence of the noise color signals by the self correlation of the noise color
signal in the plural patches of the same color.