A perceptually-tuned image coder with Channel-Optimized Trellis-Coded Quantization

A system is presented for the compression of digital imagery over binary symmetric channels (BSC). The objective is to minimize the perceived distortion for a desired target bit rate. The proposed system utilizes wavelet decomposition, channel-optimized trellis-coded quantization (COTCQ), and a perceptually-tuned rate allocation scheme to control the quantization. Because of the inherent noise-robust properties of the COTCQ stage, no channel coding is employed. Additionally, the COTCQ design does not utilize entropy coding. Consequently, the proposed image coder is especially suitable for wireless transmission due to its reduced complexity and robustness to channel errors. Examples are presented to illustrate the performance of the proposed image coding system