Abstract:
An method and associated apparatus for mapping received bits in a progressive bit plane scheme to output values which are derived by combining all previously received bits with the most recently received bits and appending additional bits to provide output values that are distributed across the output display range so as to improve recognizability of reconstructed images when only a few bit planes have been received.

Description:
TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION 
     The present invention is related to the field of digital image processing and more specifically to the transmission and reception of digital image data in a progressive manner. 
     BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
     In progressive transmission, partial image information is transmitted in a number of successive stages, and at each stage, an approximation to the original image is reconstructed at the receiver. These reconstructed images improve in quality as additional information is transmitted. Progressive transmission is motivated by the need to transmit images over low-bandwidth channels (relative to the amount of data), e.g., telephone lines, particularly in those cases where quick recognition is important or total transmission time may be limited. 
     One approach to progressive transmission is to successively transmit the bit planes of a continuous-tone image. Bit planes are binary images that are formed by selecting a single bit from the same position in the binary representation of each pixel. A k-bit image with dimensions N×N can thus be decomposed into k binary images, each with dimensions N×N. An example of bit planes for an 8-bit image is shown in FIG. 1, where the image labeled 0 is the least significant bit (LSB) plane and the image labeled 7 is the most significant bit (MSB) plane. It can be seen that the most significant bit plane contains major structural information and provides a reasonable approximation to the original image. As a result, progressive transmission usually begins by transmitting the MSB plane first and proceeds through the other bit planes in order. At each stage in the reconstruction, one or more bit planes may be transmitted. Upon receiving the LSB plane, a lossless reconstruction of the image can be obtained. To make the transmission scheme more efficient, coding techniques can be applied to the bit planes; this aspect of bit planes is not necessary (nor detrimental) to the invention disclosed herein. 
     In progressively reconstructing an image using the bit planes, output levels must be specified at each stage in order to map the received data to an output device. For example, if one bit plane (the MSB plane) is received, two output levels are required, which might be 0 and 255 for an 8-bit output device. If two bit planes are received, four output levels are required, e.g., (0, 85 ,170, and 255) for an 8-bit device, and so on as more bit planes are received. There are a number of ways that these output values can be assigned. A simple approach is to assume the output buffers are initially filled with all 0&#39;s or all 1&#39;s. As bits are received, they are placed in the appropriate positions in the buffers. For example, if the buffers are initially filled with all 0&#39;s, the two possible output values after the MSB plane is received are `00000000` and `10000000` (0 and 128) for an 8-bit display. After two bit planes are received, the four possible output values are `00000000`, `01000000`, `10000000`, and `11000000` (0, 64, 128, and 192). With this approach, the images start out dark (assuming 0 represents black) and become lighter as more levels are added. If the output buffers are initially filled with all 1&#39;s, then the image starts out light and becomes darker, e.g., the first two output levels are `01111111` and `11111111` (127 and 255). 
     A more sophisticated approach is to use look-up tables so that the output levels at each stage can be varied at will. A block diagram representing a prior-art technique is shown in FIG. 2, wherein 0 through k-1 bit planes are transmitted successively, starting with the bits of bit plane k-1 to the input of a bit combination logic block 12. Each bit in a bit plane corresponds to a single pixel of the original image, and the combination of one or more of the bits, corresponding to a pixel can be used to form a digital representation of the pixel for later reproduction. To this end, block 12 also receives as an input from a previous bits recovery logic block 20, the bits from previously received bit planes and appends the most recently received bit to the previously received bits of the corresponding pixel and provides this sequence of bits at its output. The previous bits recovery logic block 20 takes as an input from an n-bit output frame buffer 18, the previously reconstructed output value for the corresponding pixel and outputs the received bit sequence that produced this reconstructed value. A means for performing the recovery of previously received bits from the reconstructed output value is demonstrated in the section on Description of the Preferred Embodiments. The appended sequence of bits from block 12 is directed to the input of a look-up address generation logic block 14. The bit sequence is used to generate a unique address to be used as an entry into a look-up table 16. A block diagram illustrating a prior art method for generating the address is shown in FIG. 3, where the received bits are placed in an address buffer 32, and then additional bits are appended using a logic block 34 to complete the address. The appended bits consist of a variable number of &#34;don&#39;t care&#34; bits, i.e., either 0 or 1, plus a fixed number of steering bits to direct the received bit sequence to the appropriate portion of the look-up table for the total number of bits received. For an output device supporting n bits, if we have received a total of m bits for each pixel, then n-m &#34;don&#39;t care&#34; bits are appended and the number of steering bits is ceil[log 2  n], where ceil[x] indicates the smallest integer larger than x. An example is shown in Table 1 for the first three received bits of an image with an 8 bit output device, where an &#34;x&#34; in the look-up table address represents a &#34;don&#39;t care&#34; bit. For this example, the received bits are appended with enough &#34;don&#39;t care&#34; bits to make a total of eight bits, and then three steering bits are added to direct the result to the appropriate section of the look-up table. Returning to FIG. 2, the look-up table address is applied to an output value look-up table 16 to access an n-bit output value that is placed in the output frame buffer 18 as a cumulative representation of the received bits for the corresponding pixel. An n-bit display 10 is coupled to the output buffer to provide a visual image of the progression of the reconstruction. 
     
                       TABLE 1______________________________________Example of look-up table addresses.Received     Look-up TableBits         Address______________________________________ 0           0xxxxxxx000 1           1xxxxxxx000 00          00xxxxxx001 01          01xxxxxx001 10          10xxxxxx001 11          11xxxxxx001000          000xxxxx010001          001xxxxx010010          010xxxxx010011          011xxxxx010100          100xxxxx010101          101xxxxx010110          110xxxxx010111          111xxxxx010______________________________________ 
    
     Using this look-up table approach, an important question is what output levels should be used to maximize image recognizability at the early stages of the progression. The answer to this is not clear, but two approaches suggest themselves. One is to use the mean values of the possible ranges represented by the transmitted bits. This is the optimal mapping in a mean-squared error (MSE) sense. For example, after the MSB plane is received, the two possible ranges for an 8-bit display are 0 to 127 and 128 to 255, and the corresponding mean values are 63 and 191. After two bits are received, the mean values for the four possible ranges are (31, 95, 159, 223). Note that this optimal MSE approach does not take advantage of the full dynamic range of the output display, which suggests another method where the possible output values are equally spaced across the full range. For this method, the output values for an 8-bit display would be (0,255) after the MSB plane is received, (0, 85, 170, 255) after two bits, and so on. 
     Despite offering great flexibility in the mapping of bit planes to output values, the look-up table method has a potential disadvantage, namely, output devices with a large dynamic range, e.g., 10 or 12 bits, require fairly large look-up tables. This is because the address used as an entry into the look-up table consists of the received bits, plus the steering bits needed to direct the received bits to the appropriate portion of the table for the total number of bits received. For example, a 12-bit output device must have a table that can support a maximum of 12 received bits plus 4 steering bits, for a total size of 2 16  entries. In addition, the look-up table method requires at least some additional circuitry to generate the address of the memory location storing the appropriate output value. Two publications of interest for their teachings in this area are: 
     1. K.-H. Tzou, &#34;Progressive image transmission: a review and comparison of techniques,&#34; Opt. Eng., 26(7), pp. 581-589 (1987); and 
     2. M. Rabbani and P. W. Jones, Digital Image Compression Techniques, SPIE Tutorial Series, Vol. TT7, SPIE Press, Bellingham, Wash., pp. 49-57 (1991). 
     SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
     The present invention describes methods and associated apparatus for generating the output values for progressive bit plane reconstructions, in accordance with mean value and full dynamic range approaches. The advantage of these methods and associated apparatus is that they require no look-up tables, but instead rely on fairly simple circuitry (primarily shift registers) to directly derive the output values from the received bits. This circuitry is of the same complexity as that required for the address generation used in the look-up table method. Another advantage is that the techniques used to generate these values can easily map the original data and its associated bit planes to output devices with any display bit depth. 
     In the preferred method of the present invention for generating n-bit output values in a progressive bit plane reconstruction scheme, wherein an image is represented by a matrix of pixel values with each pixel value being represented by k bits, and wherein each bit plane is formed from the matrix of like ordered bits in the k-bit representation, comprising, for each pixel, the following steps are implemented: 
     a) receiving one or more bits of the k-bit representation to produce a sequence of m bits, where m represents the total number of received bits; 
     b) forming an n-bit output value by combining an n-m bit sequence with the sequence of m bits of step a); 
     c) buffering the formed n-bit output value; 
     d) recovering the previously received m bits from the buffered n-bit output value; 
     e) receiving one or more of the remaining bits of the k-bit representation; 
     f) combining the received bits of step e) with the recovered m bits of step d) to form a new m-bit sequence, where m is incremented to represent the new total nurser of received bits; 
     g) forming a new n-bit output value by combining an n-m bit sequence with the m-bit sequence of step f); 
     h) buffering the formed n-bit output value of step g); and 
     i) repeating steps d) through h) to a desired received bit depth. 
     In a preferred apparatus embodiment of the invention there is provided combination logic for receiving on a first input one or more bits of the k-bit representation and for receiving on a second input recovered previously received bits and for combining the bits received from the first input with the bits received from the second input to produce a sequence of m bits, where m represents the total number of received bits. Additionally, output value generation logic forms an n-bit output value by combining an n-m bit sequence with the sequence of m bits from the combination logic. A buffer is used to buffer the formed n-bit output value from the output value generation logic. Recovery logic recovers all previously received m bits from the buffered n-bit output value and provides the recovered previously received m bits to the second input of the combination logic. The outputs from the buffer are the n-bit output values which may be displayed on a display device for viewing of the reconstructed versions of the original image. 
     From the foregoing it can be seen that it is a primary object of the present invention to provide an improved method for accomplishing progressive bit plane reconstruction. 
     It is a further object of the present invention to provide a progressive bit plane reconstruction method that is implementable without the use of look-up tables. 
     It is another object of the present invention to provide a progressive bit plane reconstruction method that is implemented with simple hardware. 
     It is still another object of the present invention to provide a progressive bit plane reconstruction method that allows any arbitrary number of bit planes to be progressively reconstructed to any arbitrary bit depth. 
     These and other objects of the present invention will become more apparent when taken in conjunction with the following description and drawings wherein like characters indicate like parts and which drawings form a part of the present description. 
    
    
     BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
     FIG. 1 illustrates, in a sequence labeled 0 through 7, the bit planes of an eight bit image. 
     FIG. 2 illustrates in block diagram form a prior-art method for progressively reconstructing an image using a look-up table to determine output levels. 
     FIG. 3 illustrates in block diagram form a particular arrangement for generating the look-up table address required in the prior art method of FIG. 2. 
     FIG. 4 illustrates in block diagram the preferred embodiment of the invention. 
     FIG. 5 illustrates a tree diagram useful in understanding the mean value technique of the present invention. 
     FIG. 6 illustrates in further detail the mean value technique implementation used in the output value generation logic block of FIG. 4. 
     FIG. 7 illustrates a specific hardware implementation of the output value generation logic block of FIG. 6. 
     FIG. 8 illustrates in further detail the full dynamic range technique implementation used in the output value generation logic block of FIG. 4. 
     FIG. 9 illustrates a specific hardware implementation of the output value generation logic block of FIG. 8. 
     FIG. 10 illustrates in block diagram form a method for recovering previously received bits from the output buffer values. 
    
    
     DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS 
     In the following descriptions, examples are presented using an 8-bit output device (value from 0 to 255). However, as we will describe in this section, the methods work for any bit depth. Further, the descriptions in this section assume that a new output value is produced for each received bit from a bit plane; this is not a necessary condition for the described methods, and in fact, it is possible to receive the corresponding bits from more than one bit plane prior to reconstructing the appropriate output value. Note that the format used for binary numbers is (MSB . . . LSB). As a result, left-shifting means shifting the LSB towards the MSB; similarly, right-shifting means shifting the MSB towards the LSB. 
     Referring to FIG. 4, in the preferred embodiment of the invention, the output value generation logic block 40 has replaced the address generation logic block 14 and look-up table 16 shown in prior art FIG. 2, wherein like numbers indicate like components in both FIGS. 2 and 4. 
     Mean value approach 
     As stated previously, in the mean value approach, we map the received bits to the mean of the range represented by those bits. This process can be viewed as traversing the nodes of a tree diagram, where the received bits give the path through the tree. As shown in FIG. 5, the highest node in the tree is the overall mean of the output range, e.g., 127 for an 8-bit display. Upon receiving the MSB, we branch to either 63 (=127-64) if a `0` is received or 191 (=127+64) if a `1` is received. After the next bit is received, we branch to either 31 (=127-64-32) if `00` is received, 95 (=127-64-+32) if `01` is received, 159 (=127+64-32) if `10` is received, or 223 (=127+64+32) if `11` is received. Essentially, this processes is doing a successive approximation based on the received bits. The corresponding binary representations for the possible 8-bit output values at each level are given in Table 2 for the first three received bits. 
     
                       TABLE 2______________________________________Binary representation for mean value approach.Received      Output  BinaryBits          Values  Representation______________________________________ 0             63     00111111 1            191     10111111 00            31     00011111 01            95     01011111 10           159     10011111 11           223     11011111000            15     00001111001            47     00101111010            79     01001111011           111     01101111100           143     10001111101           175     10101111110           207     11001111111           239     11101111______________________________________ 
    
     Table 2 provides support for generating the output values in accordance with the mean value approach. Referring to FIG. 6, all previously received m bits are placed in an n-bit output pixel buffer 62 and the n-m bit sequence &#34;01111 . . .&#34; is appended using the output of a logic block 64 so as to fill the output pixel buffer 62. The output of filled buffer 62 represents the reconstructed output value that is derived using the mean value approach described previously. 
     An advantage of this method is that the correct output values can be generated regardless of the bit depth of the output. For example, if the output display is 10 bits deep, rather than 8 bits, we merely have to start with a 10-bit output buffer, and produce either `0011111111` (=255) or `1011111111` (=767) upon receiving the first bit; these are the correct output values for the 10-bit display. Of course, since we started with 8-bit data, we can only recover 256 levels at the end of the transmission, but the output values will be correct over this range. Similarly, 10-bit data can be progressively mapped to an 8-bit output device using this procedure, but of course only 8 bits of the original data can be used with the 8 bit output device. 
     There are a number of ways to implement this process using simple digital hardware; one such implementation is illustrated in FIG. 7, wherein a serial in/parallel in/parallel out n-bit shift register 62&#39; is initialized with the n-bit sequence &#34;01111 . . . &#34; from an initialization register 64&#39; using the parallel input to shift register 62&#39;. The received bit sequence is then right shifted into the shift register 62&#39; using the serial input, starting with the least significant bit that has been received up to this point. An input select/shift counter logic 70 is used to select whether the input is taken from the parallel or the serial inputs to register 62&#39;. For each pixel value that is to be reconstructed, the input select is initially set to the parallel input for initialization of the shift register 62&#39;, and after initialization, the input select is switched to the serial input to input the received bits. Additionally, logic 70 determines the number of shifts needed to input all received bits into register 62&#39; from the serial input. For a received sequence of m bits, a total of m shifts are required. Register 62&#39; outputs in parallel the reconstructed n-bit output value used to represent the pixel using the mean value approach described previously. 
     Full dynamic range approach 
     In the full dynamic range approach, we map the possible outputs to equally spaced values across the full dynamic range of the output device. As an example, the binary representations for the possible 8-bit output values at each level are given in Table 3 for the first three received bits. 
     
                       TABLE 3______________________________________Binary representation for full dynamic range approach.Received      Output  BinaryBits          Values  Representation______________________________________ 0             0      00000000 1            255     11111111 00            0      00000000 01            85     01010101 10           170     10101010 11           255     11111111000            0      00000000001            36     00100100010            73     01001001011           109     01101101100           146     10010010101           182     10110110110           219     11011011111           255     11111111______________________________________ 
    
     Table 3 provides support for generating the output values in accordance with the full dynamic range approach. Referring to FIG. 8, all previously received bits are placed in an n-bit output pixel buffer 82. Using a logic block 84, the received bit sequence is retreated and appended to the contents of the pixel buffer 82 until the buffer is filled. For example, if `010` is received, it is repeated as `010 010 010 . . .` to fill the buffer. The output of filled buffer 82 represents the reconstructed output value that is derived using the full dynamic range approach described previously. Importantly, this technique always produces the correct output value regardless of the bit depth of the output pixel buffer or the bit depth of the original image. 
     There are a number of ways to implement this process using simple digital hardware; one such implementation is illustrated in FIG. 9, wherein the sequence of received bits is stored right-justified in a serial-in/parallel-out shift register 82&#39; of size n, where n is the output device bit depth. The output of shift register 82&#39; is connected to an n-to-1 multiplexer 94, and the output of the multiplexer is fed back to the serial input for the shift register 82&#39; through an input switching logic 90. The input switching logic 90 selects whether the serial input is the received bit sequence or the output of the multiplexer 94. For each pixel value that is to be reconstructed, the input switching logic is initially set to pass the received bits to the shift register 82&#39;, and after passing these bits for initialization, the input switching logic is set to pass the output of the multiplexer 94 to the shift register 82&#39;. Using a bit select logic 99, the next bit to be repeated and appended is selected as the output value of the multiplexer 94, and this bit is left-shifted into the least significant bit of the shift register 82&#39;. This process of selecting a bit and appending it is repeated until the shift register contains the repeated pattern. A shift counter logic 98 determines the total number of shifts required to produce the desired output pattern from register 82&#39;. The bit extracted by the multiplexer is always the mth bit, if m bits have been received, and the total number of shifts required to fill the shift register is n-m. Register 82&#39; outputs in parallel the reconstructed n-bit output value used to represent the pixel using the full dynamic range approach described previously. 
     Recovering previously received bits 
     Based upon the examples given in Tables 2 and 3, a means for recovering previously received bits from the output buffer value will now be described. From these tables, we see that for both the mean value approach and the full dynamic range approach, the binary representation of the output value always contains the received bits as the first m bits of the output value, if m bits have been received. Referring to FIG. 10, the previously received bits can be recovered by placing the n-bit output value into a shift register 102, and then shifting out the desired m bits. The number of bits shifted out is controlled by a shift control logic block 104. 
     While there has been shown what are considered to be the preferred embodiments of the invention, it will be manifest that many changes and modifications may be made therein without departing from the essential spirit of the invention. It is intended, therefore, in the annexed claims, to cover all such changes and modifications as may fall within the true scope of the invention.