Fundamentals of

Multimedia

2nd Edition 2014

Ze-Nian Li
Mark S. Drew
Jiangchuan Liu

Topic 3 :
Graphics and Image Data
Representations 1
 Objectives
 At the end of this lesson students
should understand:

 How the graphics and image data

are represented (since it is of
crucial importance in the study of
multimedia).

 Graphics and image data types

 Popular file formats

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3.1 Graphics/Image Data Types
 We concentrate on GIF and JPG
image file formats, since the GIF
file format is one of the simplest
and contains several fundamental
features, and the JPG file format is
arguably the most important
overall.

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 3.1.1 1-Bit Images
 Images consist of pixels (picture elements in
digital images).
 A 1-bit image (also called binary image)
consists of on and off bits only and thus is the
simplest type of image.
 Each pixel is stored as a single bit (0 or 1)
 It is also sometimes called a 1-bit
monochrome (called Lena image by
scientists) image since it contains no color.
See Figure in next slide.
 Monochrome
 1-bit images can be satisfactory for pictures
containing only simple graphics and text.
 fax machines use 1-bit data, so in fact 1-bit
images are still important. 4
Monochrome 1-bit Lena image

A 640×480 monochrome image requires 38.4 kB of storage

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3.1.2 8-Bit Gray-Level Images
 8-bit image is one for which each pixel
has a gray value between 0 and 255.
 Each pixel is represented by a single
byte.
 The entire image can be thought of
as a two-dimensional array of pixel
values referred to as a bitmap.
 Image resolution refers to the
number of pixels in a digital image
(higher resolution always yields
better quality but increases size)

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Grayscale image of Lena
640×480 grayscale image requires 300kB of storage

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 3.1.4 24-Bit Color Images
 In a color 24-bit image, each pixel is
represented by three bytes, usually
representing RGB.

 Since each value is in the range 0–255,

this format supports 256×256×256, or a
total of 16,777,216, possible combined
colors; which increases storage size.

 a 640 × 480 24-bit color image would

require 921.6 kB of storage. (without any
compression applied)
 Compression is used to decrease the
image size by simply grouping pixels
effectively. 8
24-bit color image
[Link]
Microsoft Windows BMP format

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3.1.5 Higher Bit-Depth Images
 In some fields such as medicine (security
cameras, satellite imaging) more
accurate images are required to see the
patient’s liver, for example.

 To get such images, special cameras

that view more than just 3 colors (RGB)
are used.

 Such images are called multispectral

(more than three colors) or
hyperspectral (224 colors for satellite
imaging).
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 3.1.6 8-Bit Color Images
 reasonably accurate color images can be
obtained by quantizing the color information
to collapse it.
 Color quantizing example: reducing the
number of colors required to represent a
digital image makes it possible to reduce its
file size.
 8-bit color image (so-called 256 colors) files
use the concept of a lookup table (LUT) to
store color information.
 For example,:
 if exactly 23 pixels have RGB values (45, 200, 91)
 then store the value 23 in a three-dimensional
array, at the element indexed by the index values
[45, 200, 91].
 This data structure is called a color histogram.
 color histogram: is a very useful tool for
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image transformation and manipulation in
Image Processing.
Notice that the difference between Fig. 3.5a, the
24-bit image, and Fig. 3.7, the 8-bit image, is
reasonably small.

Fig. 3.5a, the 24-bit image

Fig. 3.7, the 8-bit image

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Another example for difference between Fig. 3.5a,
the 24-bit image, and Fig. 3.7, the 8-bit image, is
reasonably small.

Fig. 3.5a, the 24-bit image

Fig. 3.7, the 8-bit image

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 3.1.6 8-Bit Color Images
 Note the great savings in space for 8-
bit images over 24-bit ones:
 a 640 × 480 8-bit color image requires
only 300 kB of storage,
 compared to the 921.6 kB of storage
for 24-bit color image (again, without
any compression applied).

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 3.1.7 Color Lookup Tables
 The LUT is often called a palette.
 The idea is to store only the index, or code
value, for each pixel.
 if a pixel stores, say, the value 25 (Figure
3.8), the meaning is to go to row 25 in a
color lookup table (LUT).

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•A Color-picker consists of an array of fairly large blocks of
color (or a semi-continuous range of colors) such that a mouse-
click will select the color indicated.
- In reality, a color-picker displays the palette colors
associated with index values from 0 to 255.
- Fig. 3.9 (next slide) displays the concept of a color-picker:
if the user selects the color block with index value 2, then
the color meant is cyan, with RGB values (0, 255, 255).

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Fig. 3.9: Color-picker for 8-bit color: each block of the
color-picker corresponds to one row of the color LUT

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 3.2 Popular File Formats
• 8-bit GIF : one of the most important
formats because of its historical connection
to the WWW and HTML markup language as
the first image type recognized by net
browsers.

• JPEG: currently the most important common

file format.

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 3.2.1 GIF
• GIF standard (Graphics Interchange Format): (We
examine GIF standard because it is so simple! yet
contains many common elements.)
 Limited to 8-bit (256) color images only, which, while
producing acceptable color images, is best suited for
images with few distinctive colors (e.g., graphics or
drawing).

• GIF standard supports interlacing — successive display

of pixels in widely-spaced rows by a 4-pass display
process. (Figure 3.16, slide 26)

 interlacing allows a quick sketch to appear when a web

browser displays the image, followed by more detailed
fill-ins.

 The JPEG standard (below) has a similar display mode,

denoted progressive mode.
 GIF has two formats GIF87 (standard) and GIF89 supports
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simple animation.
3.2.1 GIF

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 GIF87
• For the standard specification, the general file format of
a GIF87 file is as in Fig. 3.12.
• The Signature is six bytes
• the Screen Descriptor is a seven-byte
• Local Color Map (if does not exist
A global color map can be defined)
 A GIF87 file can contain more than one image
definition, usually to fit on several different parts
of the screen.
 actual raster data itself is first
compressed using the LZW compression
scheme (see Chap. 7)

Fig. 3.12: GIF file 21

format.
• Screen Descriptor comprises a set of attributes that
belong to every image in the file. According to the GIF87
standard, it is defined as in Fig. 3.13.
• LSB/ MSB :
Least/Most Significant Byte

 Bit 7 is filled with zeros

Fig. 3.13: GIF screen

descriptor. 22
• Color Map is set up in a very simple fashion as in Fig.
3.14. However, the actual length of the table equals
2(pixel+1) as given in the Screen Descriptor.

Fig. 3.14: GIF color map.

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• Each image in the file has its own Image
Descriptor, defined as in Fig. 3.15.

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Fig. 3.15: GIF image
descriptor.
interlace
 If the interlace bit is set to (1), then the local
Image Descriptor, the rows of the image are
displayed in a four-pass sequence, as in Fig.
3.16. (next slide)
 Here, the first pass displays rows 0 and 8, the
second pass displays rows 4 and 12, and so
on.

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Fig. 3.16: GIF 4-pass interlace display row order.
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 3.2.2 JPEG
• JPEG (Joint Photographic Experts Group): The
most important current standard for image
compression (.jpg, .jpeg, .jpe).

 The human vision system has some specific

limitations (The eye–brain system cannot see
extremely fine detail; those are dropped ) and JPEG
takes advantage of these to achieve high rates of
compression.

• JPEG allows the user to set a desired level of

quality, or compression ratio (input divided by
output).

• As an example, Fig. 3.17 shows our forestfire

image, with a quality factor Q=10%.
 - This image is a mere 1.5% of the original size. In
comparison, a JPEG image with Q=75% yields an
image size 5.6% of the original, whereas a GIF 27
version of this image compresses down to 23.0% of
uncompressed image size.
A photo of a flower compressed with successively more
lossy compression ratios from left to right.

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Fig. 3.17: JPEG image with low quality specified by user.

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PNG
• PNG format: standing for Portable Network
Graphics — meant to supersede the GIF standard,
and extends it in important ways.

• Special features of PNG files include:

1. Support for up to 48 bits of color information — a

large increase.

2. Files may contain gamma-correction information

for correct display of color images, as well as alpha-
channel information for such uses as control of
transparency.

3. The display of image pixel: progressively displays

pixels in a 2-dimensional fashion by showing a few
pixels at a time over seven passes through each
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8 X 8 block of an image.
TIFF
• TIFF: stands for Tagged Image File Format.

• The support for attachment of additional information

(referred to as “tags”) provides a great deal of
flexibility.

1. The most important tag is a format signifier: what

type of compression etc. is in use in the stored image.

2. TIFF can store many different types of image: 1-bit,

grayscale, 8-bit color, 24-bit RGB, etc.

3. TIFF was originally a lossless format but now a new

JPEG tag allows one to opt for JPEG compression.

4. The TIFF format was developed by the Aldus

Corporation in the 1980's and was later supported by
Microsoft.
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 3.2.9 PS and PDF
 PostScript is an important language for
typesetting, and many high-end printers have a
PostScript interpreter built into them.

 PostScript is a vector-based, rather than pixel

based, picture language: page elements are
essentially defined in terms of vectors.

 PostScript includes vector/structured graphics as

well as text

 Several popular graphics programs, such as

Adobe Illustrator, use PostScript.

 Note, however, that the PostScript page

description language does not provide
compression; in fact, PostScript files are just 32
stored as ASCII.
 3.2.9 PS and PDF
 Therefore, another text + figures language has
largely superseded PostScript is Portable
Document Format (PDF) file format.

 PDF files that do not include images have about

the same compression ratio, while

 For files containing images, PDF may achieve

higher compression ratios by using separate
JPEG compression for the image content

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End of Chapter 3

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