An image processing apparatus includes a quantizer configured to quantize orthogonal transform coefficients of the difference in block units between a coding target picture and a prediction image, a predictor configured to conduct parallax prediction utilizing correlations between the coding target picture and a picture whose view differs from the coding target picture, and a quantization controller configured to determine a protected area that protects image quality from the parallax prediction results, and reduce the quantization step size of the quantizer for quantization of the protected area.