JPEG2000, the next millennium compression standard for still images

With the increasing use of multimedia technologies, image compression requires higher performance as well as new functionality. To address this need in the specific area of still image encoding, a new standard is currently being designed: JPEG2000. We see what the exact goals are of this future standard, which applications it addresses and the current standardisation process. Then we show through the descriptions of two available demonstrations what kind of results are already reachable with the current status of the standard. The first demonstration describes a Java implementation of the future standard, details the advantages of such an implementation and compares the performance of JPEG2000 with that of JPEG. The second demonstration describes how JPEG2000 can be used in domains were the transmission bandwidth is very restricted, taking advantages of new functions such as the definition of regions of interest and progressive transmission.