Piecewise-linear subband coding scheme for fast image decomposition

Abstract

Transform coding methods play a very important role in the development of diverse multimedia technologies. The discrete cosine and wavelet transforms are frequently used in the field of image processing and set up a basis for contemporary image compression standards (JPEG, MPEG). In this paper a novel two-channel piecewise-linear subband coding scheme (PL-SBC) is introduced. Its most important advantage are exceptionally fast and easy for implementation computational algorithms combined with good reconstruction quality. The proposed PL-SBC system is based on the dual filter bank consisting of a single filter at the decomposition stage and a single one at the reconstruction stage. For the presented PL-SBC scheme, the conditions of perfect reconstruction and the piecewise-linear approximation filter bank have been defined. The compression properties of a new subband coding scheme have been analysed for different categories of images and in comparison with well-known signal transforms, such as cosine, piecewise-linear, piecewise-constant and wavelet transforms. The research includes a comparison of the reconstruction error both in objective as well as subjective approach.