ADAPTIVE IMAGE DATA COMPRESSION FOR ELECTRONIC STILL PHOTOGRAPHY SYSTEMS

ELECTRONIC IMAGERY, INC. WILL CONDUCT R/R&D IN THE AREA OF DATA COMPRESSION SOFTWARE AND HARDWARE FOR COMPRESSING MEGA PIXEL IMAGE DATA FOR ELECTRONIC STILL PHOTOGRAPHY SYSTEMS. FEASIBILITY OF USING APPROPRIATE ALGORITHMS FOR LOWLOSS AND LOSSLESS DATA COMPRESSION WILL BE INVESTIGATED. FEASIBILITY OF COMBINING SUCH ALGORITHMS TO PRODUCE THE HIGHEST LEVEL OF DATA COMPRESSION BASED ON AN INPUT PARAMETER SPECIFYING THE LEVEL OF ACCEPTABLE DATA LOSS WILL ALSO BE DETERMINED. ONCE THE FEASIBILITY HAS BEEN ESTABLISHED, THESE ALGORITHMS WILL BE MODIFIED FOR USE IN MULTIPLE APPLICATIONS, TESTED AND INCORPORATED ELECTRONICALLY IN AN OFF-THE-SHELF DATA COMPRESSION CIRCUIT BOARD CHOSEN BASED ON PERFORMANCE AND SUITABILITY FOR EASY RETROFITTING. IN PHASE II, THE ALGORITHMS AND THE MODIFIED DATA COMPRESSION CIRCUIT BOARD AS DEVELOPED IN PHASE I WILL BE FURTHER OPTIMIZED SO AS TO DEVELOP A UNIQUE CUSTOM PRINTED CIRCUIT BOARD. A PROTOTYPE OF THIS CUSTOM CIRCUIT BOARD WILL BE PRODUCED AS PART OF THE PHASE II PROJECT ACTIVITY.