Method and format for storing and selectively retrieving image data
US5682441A · kind A · utility
Assignee
Inventors
Key dates
| Filing date | Nov 8, 1995 |
| Grant date | Oct 28, 1997 |
| Priority date | — |
| Expiry date | Nov 8, 2015 |
Classification
- Technology area (CPC H)Electricity
- CPC primaryH04N19/63
- WIPO fieldAudio-visual technology
- WIPO sectorElectrical engineering
Abstract
A method of processing an input image for storage includes decomposing the input image into a number of images at various resolutions, subdividing at least some of these images into tiles (rectangular arrays) and storing a block (referred to as the "tile block") representing each of the tiles, along with an index that specifies the respective locations of the tile blocks. In specific embodiments, the tiles are 64.times.64 pixels or 128.times.128 pixels. The representations of the tiles are typically compressed versions of the tiles. In a specific embodiment, JPEG compression is used. In a specific embodiment, an operand image is recursively decomposed to produce a reduced image and a set of additional (or complementary) pixel data. At the first stage, the operand image is normally the input image, and, for each subsequent stage, the operand image is the reduced image from the previous stage. At each stage, the reduced image is at a characteristic resolution that is lower than the resolution of the operand image. The processing is typically carried out until the resulting reduced image is of a desired small size.
Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.