Abstract: A method, computer system, and a computer program product is disclosed for encoding a sequence of frames as one or more compressed bitstreams, the method includes a processor obtaining a sequence of frames in an order and performing a wavelet transform on each frame of the sequence of frames independently in the order. The processor constructs a significant points list and an insignificant sets list, creating one or more spatial trees comprised of branch nodes of the list of insignificant sets for each frame of the sequence of frames. The processor initializes the significant points list and the list of insignificant sets for each frame and identifies a most significant bit in each frame and for each frame, selects at least one coding unit and creates a progressive significance map for coding. The processor writes a global header and a local header for the compressed bitstreams for each coding unit.

Abstract: A method, computer system, and a computer program product is disclosed for encoding a sequence of color frames. The method includes a processor obtaining a sequence of color frames and rendering a first frame of the sequence in at least three components, each component representing a different color value. For each of the at least three components, the processor performs a wavelet transform on the first frame, initializes a significant points list and a list of insignificant sets to create an individual spatial tree of the list of insignificant sets for each component, searches all of the at least three components to identify a most significant bit in the first frame, and creates a consolidated significance map with all the color components for the first frame by searching the individual spatial tree for each component. The processor then obtains this significance map and utilizes the significance map to encode the first frame.

Abstract: A data compression technique includes a subband decomposition of a source image followed by coding of the coefficients of the resultant subband decomposition for storage and/or transmission. During coding, three ordered lists are used comprising a list of significant pixels (LSP), a list of insignificant pixels (LIP) and a list of insignificant sets of pixels (LIS). The pixels in the LIP are tested, and those that are significant at a current quantization level are moved to the LSP. Similarly, sets are sequentially evaluated following the LIS order, and when a set is found to be significant it is removed from the LIS and partitioned into new subsets. The new subsets with more than one element are added back to the end of the LIS, while the single-coordinate sets are added to the end of the LIP or to the end of the LSP, depending whether they are insignificant or significant, respectively.