Palette segmentation indexing

Abstract

The MetaMap process is particularly suited for representing and linking spatial and textual information in the development of interactive applications which must access large databases of 2-D and 3-D raster images. This process has proven particularly effective for the development of multimedia educational programs for medical education, such as interactive atlases for the anatomical sciences. MetaMap processing allows a user to obtain descriptive information concerning a feature of a displayed image by point to the location of the feature. Conversely, the user may enter descriptive textual information, and the locations of the responsive features are indicated. The data processing and memory storage requirements are minimized by encoding information about the image as a pixel/voxel bit map, and a color map in which the addresses or indices of the color map are correlated with the addresses or pointers to strings of descriptive information. Each color map address corresponds to a predefined set of features and descriptive information about those features. Since the pixel/voxel bit map defines a color map address for each location on the image, suitable programming of the color map can insure proper correlation of descriptive information with corresponding locations on the image. The correlation between color map addresses and the descriptive information about the features is represented most compactly by arranging or sorting the entries in the color map so that there is a correspondence between each predefined feature and a continous range of color map addresses. Therefore, for a specified color map address, the corresponding set of features and their pointers can be found by comparing the specified color map address to the limits of the color map address ranges for the various features. This interface allows hypermedia-type linking of image features to relevant multimedia "objects" such as test, images, sounds, and animations. Computational efficiency is maximized so that effective multimedia systems can be developed on low-end microprocessor platforms such as Intel 8088 or 80286-based systems. The method and apparatus for implementing the MetaMap process is protected by U.S. Patent #4,847,604.