An adaptive algorithm for extracting foreground objects om background in videophone or videoconference applications is presented in this paper The algorithm uses a neural network architecture that classifies the video frames in regions-of-interest (ROI) and non-ROI areas, also being able to automatically adapt its performance to scene changes. The algorithm is incorporated in motion-compensation discrete cosine transform (MC-DCT) - based coding schemes, allocating more bits to ROI than to non-ROI areas. Simulation results presented, using the Claire and Trevor sequences, which show reconstructed images of better quality, as well as signal-to-noise ratio improvements of about 1.4dB, compared to those achieved by standard MC-DCT encoders.