A family of wavelets for image compression satisfying perceptual criteria

This paper presents a technique for biorthogonal linear-phase wavelet design for image compression. Wavelet design is based on direct optimization of the lowpass analysis filter using as objective the maximization of the function defined as the product of the theoretical coding gain and an index recently reported, called peak-to-peak ratio (PPR). With this function the perceptual quality expected for the compressed images can be evaluated without having to go through tests with experts. Also, such a measure can be used to design wavelets optimized according to perceptual criteria. A simplified design procedure was developed using a technique to generate high-order filters from lower-order ones. The filters thus obtained show a surprisingly good performance with relatively low orders