J2K TODAY

The most common question I get asked about JPEG2000 is, “That’s JPEG, right”? It’s a natural question really; I’d probably assume the same thing if I wasn’t in the image compression business. And as most people aren’t “in” the image compression industry, that’s why it gets asked a lot. In my opinion, it is the single biggest reason why JPEG2000 has not taken off the way it should, but that’s slowly changing.

So why did they call it JPEG2000? JPEG stands for Joint Photographic Experts Group, which is the name of the committee responsible for the formation of the original JPEG standard. Work on JPEG began in 1982, culminating with the publishing of the standard in 1992 after which people started widespread adoption.

The foundation of JPEG compression is based on DCT (Discrete Cosine Transfer), which at the time, was “cutting edge” in compression theory and technology. JPEG has enjoyed tremendous success since; it is the most widely used compression format for continuous tone (full color) images on the planet. It has found itself at home on the web, handheld devices such as digital cameras, cell phones, iPods, scanners, printers and just about anywhere you have full color images. And because of it’s widespread use and adoption most people know the name and are familiar with it. So, when they hear “JPEG2000”, they naturally assume “That’s JPEG, right”?

Regarding JPEG2000, the only thing similar between it and JPEG is that the same ISO committee was involved in its development and standardization! The underlying technology at the heart of JPEG2000 is based on DWT (Discrete Wavelet Transform) compression which is fundamentally different from the DCT used in JPEG. In fact, it is an order of magnitude more complex and offers a rich set of features not found in JPEG or in any other ISO still image formats.

JPEG2000 is to JPEG as the internal combustion engine was to the steam engine. The steam engine got things started but the world really changed after the internal combustion engine gained widespread use.

JPEG2000 solves many of the limitations found in standard JPEG. It has interactive client/server features, functions extremely well in noisy environments such as wireless channels, offers both lossless and lossy compression in the same codec and on average yields 40% smaller file sizes when compared to JPEG images compressed to the same quality level. So all the shortcomings of standard JPEG are solved with JPEG2000 and then some.

So the ISO committee did a great job on the technology but missed horribly on the name. In the long run, I do not think the name will be a factor but clearly in the short term it sure has caused a lot of confusion in the marketplace.

Could they have chosen a different name which may have resulted in less confusion and helped drive adoption? I think so, and most people I have spoken with in the JPEG2000 business all agree. The similarity in names has resulted in the need for continual market education and that is always an expensive process!

So the next time someone asks you “Have you heard of JPEG2000”, you’ll know not to answer “That’s JPEG, right”?

As a lifelong fan of the Chicago Bears it was with great anticipation that I watch this past Super Bowl. I doubted their chances, seemed like the Colts were destined, but nonetheless it was a chance to recall good times from my college days when the Bears last took the title.

Today’s television technology is far superior to that of 1985 and I gathered with friends to watch the game in HD on a relatively new HDTV. It was interesting to watch as everybody just waxed about how great the picture quality was. Being in the field of video compression, I offered a more scrutinizing eye. Keep in mind its difficult to take a contrarian position with someone who spent thousands on a HDTV and hundreds on a subscription to the HD channels.

Okay, the visual wasn’t bad…but it wasn’t outstanding. As a recent attendee of CES, I’ve seen much better. I have recently read that this is a major issue with many electronics retailers today…that being the complaint and support calls for HDTVs.

So what’s going on?

From my experience, I think we are seeing a few things in play. I had a very interesting conversation with a gentlemen from DirectTV at the CES show. I got a lot of insight into both the technology and process required to deliver content over the “last mile”. Basically the same infrastructure has been in place for most of the past decade and compromises need to be made to accomodate all the new content and the desire for HD content.

One big difference is the size, quality and availability of today’s displays. It was one thing to see video content on a 36″ television, but now we are talking about 48″, 52″ and 60″ being practical and reasonably priced. Also consider that most content is being delivered in either MPEG2 or MPEG4 formats, both of which were conceived and primarily developed for constraints that are no longer prevalent. When you throw an MPEG2 signal on a 60″ display the compression artifacts are going to be evident.

But isn’t bandwidth still the issue?

Yes it is and that still seems to be the crux of the problem. The pipes are getting fatter, but we’re demanding more and more content and more HD content. Any extra bandwidth fills up real quick. When that happens, then more compression is applied and the visual result begins to suffer. As told to me, the content providers are trying to delivery HD content under a data rate of 20 Mbps and often ratchet that down to 10 Mbps. HD content at 10 Mbps will show noticable degradation to even the untrained eye.

Are sporting events even more of a challenge?

Yes, they are and here’s why. The MPEG formats use temporal compression techniques, also known as interframe compression. In the most basic sense, the encoder looks for redundancies that exist amongst sequential frames of video. By removing this redundant content you can achieve far greater compression. Since sporting events have a lot of moving action, a shimmering background of fans and multiple cameras in use, the ability to find redundancies is greatly diminished. If you’re still targeting the same bit rate, then you achieve the target compression by greatly reducing the quality of the video content through spatial or single frame compression. I suspect this is what I was seeing last Sunday.

Okay JPEG2000 gurus, what role might that play in solving this problem?

Good question…I think the jury is still out on this. JPEG2000 will never achieve the same data rates as that of MPEG2, MPEG4 or H.264 in most circumstances. Add to the fact that there is an entire infrastrucure built around those standards…tough to change overnight. But I see three things that might greatly influence whether JPEG2000 makes it into your home, they are:

IPTV - if the on-demand pull model over IP becomes prevalent, then the bandwidth issues are greatly diminished since delivering 400 channels is replaced with only a few high quality streams that you select. There’s a lot of traction for JPEG2000 in these circles as evident by the recent SMPTE meeting for IPTV.

Digital Cinema - here me out on this, the movie industry would love an “author once, deliver to many” model by which to control their content. This would potentially remove a lot of intermediaries who, of course, take a cut of the action. JPEG2000 is really the only format that makes that practical…and the movie industry has already mandated JPEG2000. If you think this concept is too far reaching then I point you to the music industry. When is the last time you bought a CD at Tower Records? Oh that’s right, they closed all their retail stores.

UWB - this seems like a strange choice, but the UWB vendors might stand to be the first folks to get JPEG2000 decoders built directly into televisions. If that gets traction…watch out…can you say disruptive techology.