When a photograph album is generated by laying out images, a background image is set in accordance with the images. Image data sets representing the images are input to background setting means and area ratio calculation means calculates a ratio of an area where a chroma value is not smaller than a predetermined threshold value for an entire area of each image. Setting means finds a ratio of the image data sets whose area ratio is not smaller than a predetermined threshold value to all the image data sets, and sets the background color to white or beige if the ratio is small. If the ratio is large, a hue histogram is generated and the background color is set in accordance with a hue appearing with the largest frequency. Layout means arranges the images on the background to obtain album data. A printer prints the album data.