A METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR PROVIDING ADAPTIVE MULTIPLE RESOLUTION TO OPTICAL IMAGERS

摘要

Method and apparatus for image compression while maintaining high resolution in selected areas within the image. An acquired image is represented by a two dimensional array of MxN pixels. The array is divided into blocks. Data related to the division of the array into blocks is stored and a threshold level of pixel attribute value is determined. The average attribute value of each block is calculated and stored. The average attribute value of each block is compared to the average attribute value of its adjacent blocks. Whenever the difference between two adjacent compared blocks is greater than the threshold level and as long as the block size is larger than one pixel, the adjacent compared blocks are divided into sub-blocks, each of which containing A/2xB/2 pixels and data related to the division of the adjacent compared blocks into sub-blocks is stored.