DIGITAL IMAGERY is pervasive in our world today. Consequently,
standards for the efficient representation and
interchange of digital images are essential. To date, some of
the most successful still image compression standards have resulted
from the ongoing work of the Joint Photographic Experts
Group (JPEG). This group operates under the auspices of Joint
Technical Committee 1, Subcommittee 29, Working Group 1
(JTC 1/SC 29/WG 1), a collaborative effort between the International
Organization for Standardization (ISO) and International
Telecommunication Union Standardization Sector (ITUT).
Both the JPEG [1–3] and JPEG-LS [4–6] standards were
born from the work of the JPEG committee. For the last few
years, the JPEG committee has been working towards the establishment
of a new standard known as JPEG 2000 (i.e., ISO/IEC
15444). The fruits of these labors are now coming to bear, as
JPEG-2000 Part 1 (i.e., ISO/IEC 15444-1 [7]) has recently been
approved as a new international standard.
