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2DRAFT TIFF Technical Note #2 17-Mar-95
3============================
4
5This Technical Note describes serious problems that have been found in
6TIFF 6.0's design for embedding JPEG-compressed data in TIFF (Section 22
7of the TIFF 6.0 spec of 3 June 1992). A replacement TIFF/JPEG
8specification is given. Some corrections to Section 21 are also given.
9
10To permit TIFF implementations to continue to read existing files, the 6.0
11JPEG fields and tag values will remain reserved indefinitely. However,
12TIFF writers are strongly discouraged from using the 6.0 JPEG design. It
13is expected that the next full release of the TIFF specification will not
14describe the old design at all, except to note that certain tag numbers
15are reserved. The existing Section 22 will be replaced by the
16specification text given in the second part of this Tech Note.
17
18
19Problems in TIFF 6.0 JPEG
20=========================
21
22Abandoning a published spec is not a step to be taken lightly. This
23section summarizes the reasons that have forced this decision.
24TIFF 6.0's JPEG design suffers from design errors and limitations,
25ambiguities, and unnecessary complexity.
26
27
28Design errors and limitations
29-----------------------------
30
31The fundamental design error in the existing Section 22 is that JPEG's
32various tables and parameters are broken out as separate fields which the
33TIFF control logic must manage. This is bad software engineering: that
34information should be treated as private to the JPEG codec
35(compressor/decompressor). Worse, the fields themselves are specified
36without sufficient thought for future extension and without regard to
37well-established TIFF conventions. Here are some of the significant
38problems:
39
40* The JPEGxxTable fields do not store the table data directly in the
41IFD/field structure; rather, the fields hold pointers to information
42elsewhere in the file. This requires special-purpose code to be added to
43*every* TIFF-manipulating application, whether it needs to decode JPEG
44image data or not. Even a trivial TIFF editor, for example a program to
45add an ImageDescription field to a TIFF file, must be explicitly aware of
46the internal structure of the JPEG-related tables, or else it will probably
47break the file. Every other auxiliary field in the TIFF spec contains
48data, not pointers, and can be copied or relocated by standard code that
49doesn't know anything about the particular field. This is a crucial
50property of the TIFF format that must not be given up.
51
52* To manipulate these fields, the TIFF control logic is required to know a
53great deal about JPEG details, for example such arcana as how to compute
54the length of a Huffman code table --- the length is not supplied in the
55field structure and can only be found by inspecting the table contents.
56This is again a violation of good software practice. Moreover, it will
57prevent easy adoption of future JPEG extensions that might change these
58low-level details.
59
60* The design neglects the fact that baseline JPEG codecs support only two
61sets of Huffman tables: it specifies a separate table for each color
62component. This implies that encoders must waste space (by storing
63duplicate Huffman tables) or else violate the well-founded TIFF convention
64that prohibits duplicate pointers. Furthermore, baseline decoders must
65test to find out which tables are identical, a waste of time and code
66space.
67
68* The JPEGInterchangeFormat field also violates TIFF's proscription against
69duplicate pointers: the normal strip/tile pointers are expected to point
70into the larger data area pointed to by JPEGInterchangeFormat. All TIFF
71editing applications must be specifically aware of this relationship, since
72they must maintain it or else delete the JPEGInterchangeFormat field. The
73JPEGxxTables fields are also likely to point into the JPEGInterchangeFormat
74area, creating additional pointer relationships that must be maintained.
75
76* The JPEGQTables field is fixed at a byte per table entry; there is no
77way to support 16-bit quantization values. This is a serious impediment
78to extending TIFF to use 12-bit JPEG.
79
80* The 6.0 design cannot support using different quantization tables in
81different strips/tiles of an image (so as to encode some areas at higher
82quality than others). Furthermore, since quantization tables are tied
83one-for-one to color components, the design cannot support table switching
84options that are likely to be added in future JPEG revisions.
85
86
87Ambiguities
88-----------
89
90Several incompatible interpretations are possible for 6.0's treatment of
91JPEG restart markers:
92
93 * It is unclear whether restart markers must be omitted at TIFF segment
94 (strip/tile) boundaries, or whether they are optional.
95
96 * It is unclear whether the segment size is required to be chosen as
97 a multiple of the specified restart interval (if any); perhaps the
98 JPEG codec is supposed to be reset at each segment boundary as if
99 there were a restart marker there, even if the boundary does not fall
100 at a multiple of the nominal restart interval.
101
102 * The spec fails to address the question of restart marker numbering:
103 do the numbers begin again within each segment, or not?
104
105That last point is particularly nasty. If we make numbering begin again
106within each segment, we give up the ability to impose a TIFF strip/tile
107structure on an existing JPEG datastream with restarts (which was clearly a
108goal of Section 22's authors). But the other choice interferes with random
109access to the image segments: a reader must compute the first restart
110number to be expected within a segment, and must have a way to reset its
111JPEG decoder to expect a nonzero restart number first. This may not even
112be possible with some JPEG chips.
113
114The tile height restriction found on page 104 contradicts Section 15's
115general description of tiles. For an image that is not vertically
116downsampled, page 104 specifies a tile height of one MCU or 8 pixels; but
117Section 15 requires tiles to be a multiple of 16 pixels high.
118
119This Tech Note does not attempt to resolve these ambiguities, so
120implementations that follow the 6.0 design should be aware that
121inter-application compatibility problems are likely to arise.
122
123
124Unnecessary complexity
125----------------------
126
127The 6.0 design creates problems for implementations that need to keep the
128JPEG codec separate from the TIFF control logic --- for example, consider
129using a JPEG chip that was not designed specifically for TIFF. JPEG codecs
130generally want to produce or consume a standard ISO JPEG datastream, not
131just raw compressed data. (If they were to handle raw data, a separate
132out-of-band mechanism would be needed to load tables into the codec.)
133With such a codec, the TIFF control logic must parse JPEG markers emitted
134by the codec to create the TIFF table fields (when writing) or synthesize
135JPEG markers from the TIFF fields to feed the codec (when reading). This
136means that the control logic must know a great deal more about JPEG details
137than we would like. The parsing and reconstruction of the markers also
138represents a fair amount of unnecessary work.
139
140Quite a few implementors have proposed writing "TIFF/JPEG" files in which
141a standard JPEG datastream is simply dumped into the file and pointed to
142by JPEGInterchangeFormat. To avoid parsing the JPEG datastream, they
143suggest not writing the JPEG auxiliary fields (JPEGxxTables etc) nor even
144the basic TIFF strip/tile data pointers. This approach is incompatible
145with implementations that handle the full TIFF 6.0 JPEG design, since they
146will expect to find strip/tile pointers and auxiliary fields. Indeed this
147is arguably not TIFF at all, since *all* TIFF-reading applications expect
148to find strip or tile pointers. A subset implementation that is not
149upward-compatible with the full spec is clearly unacceptable. However,
150the frequency with which this idea has come up makes it clear that
151implementors find the existing Section 22 too complex.
152
153
154Overview of the solution
155========================
156
157To solve these problems, we adopt a new design for embedding
158JPEG-compressed data in TIFF files. The new design uses only complete,
159uninterpreted ISO JPEG datastreams, so it should be much more forgiving of
160extensions to the ISO standard. It should also be far easier to implement
161using unmodified JPEG codecs.
162
163To reduce overhead in multi-segment TIFF files, we allow JPEG overhead
164tables to be stored just once in a JPEGTables auxiliary field. This
165feature does not violate the integrity of the JPEG datastreams, because it
166uses the notions of "tables-only datastreams" and "abbreviated image
167datastreams" as defined by the ISO standard.
168
169To prevent confusion with the old design, the new design is given a new
170Compression tag value, Compression=7. Readers that need to handle
171existing 6.0 JPEG files may read both old and new files, using whatever
172interpretation of the 6.0 spec they did before. Compression tag value 6
173and the field tag numbers defined by 6.0 section 22 will remain reserved
174indefinitely, even though detailed descriptions of them will be dropped
175from future editions of the TIFF specification.
176
177
178Replacement TIFF/JPEG specification
179===================================
180
181[This section of the Tech Note is expected to replace Section 22 in the
182next release of the TIFF specification.]
183
184This section describes TIFF compression scheme 7, a high-performance
185compression method for continuous-tone images.
186
187Introduction
188------------
189
190This TIFF compression method uses the international standard for image
191compression ISO/IEC 10918-1, usually known as "JPEG" (after the original
192name of the standards committee, Joint Photographic Experts Group). JPEG
193is a joint ISO/CCITT standard for compression of continuous-tone images.
194
195The JPEG committee decided that because of the broad scope of the standard,
196no one algorithmic procedure was able to satisfy the requirements of all
197applications. Instead, the JPEG standard became a "toolkit" of multiple
198algorithms and optional capabilities. Individual applications may select
199a subset of the JPEG standard that meets their requirements.
200
201The most important distinction among the JPEG processes is between lossy
202and lossless compression. Lossy compression methods provide high
203compression but allow only approximate reconstruction of the original
204image. JPEG's lossy processes allow the encoder to trade off compressed
205file size against reconstruction fidelity over a wide range. Typically,
20610:1 or more compression of full-color data can be obtained while keeping
207the reconstructed image visually indistinguishable from the original. Much
208higher compression ratios are possible if a low-quality reconstructed image
209is acceptable. Lossless compression provides exact reconstruction of the
210source data, but the achievable compression ratio is much lower than for
211the lossy processes; JPEG's rather simple lossless process typically
212achieves around 2:1 compression of full-color data.
213
214The most widely implemented JPEG subset is the "baseline" JPEG process.
215This provides lossy compression of 8-bit-per-channel data. Optional
216extensions include 12-bit-per-channel data, arithmetic entropy coding for
217better compression, and progressive/hierarchical representations. The
218lossless process is an independent algorithm that has little in
219common with the lossy processes.
220
221It should be noted that the optional arithmetic-coding extension is subject
222to several US and Japanese patents. To avoid patent problems, use of
223arithmetic coding processes in TIFF files intended for inter-application
224interchange is discouraged.
225
226All of the JPEG processes are useful only for "continuous tone" data,
227in which the difference between adjacent pixel values is usually small.
228Low-bit-depth source data is not appropriate for JPEG compression, nor
229are palette-color images good candidates. The JPEG processes work well
230on grayscale and full-color data.
231
232Describing the JPEG compression algorithms in sufficient detail to permit
233implementation would require more space than we have here. Instead, we
234refer the reader to the References section.
235
236
237What data is being compressed?
238------------------------------
239
240In lossy JPEG compression, it is customary to convert color source data
241to YCbCr and then downsample it before JPEG compression. This gives
2422:1 data compression with hardly any visible image degradation, and it
243permits additional space savings within the JPEG compression step proper.
244However, these steps are not considered part of the ISO JPEG standard.
245The ISO standard is "color blind": it accepts data in any color space.
246
247For TIFF purposes, the JPEG compression tag is considered to represent the
248ISO JPEG compression standard only. The ISO standard is applied to the
249same data that would be stored in the TIFF file if no compression were
250used. Therefore, if color conversion or downsampling are used, they must
251be reflected in the regular TIFF fields; these steps are not considered to
252be implicit in the JPEG compression tag value. PhotometricInterpretation
253and related fields shall describe the color space actually stored in the
254file. With the TIFF 6.0 field definitions, downsampling is permissible
255only for YCbCr data, and it must correspond to the YCbCrSubSampling field.
256(Note that the default value for this field is not 1,1; so the default for
257YCbCr is to apply downsampling!) It is likely that future versions of TIFF
258will provide additional PhotometricInterpretation values and a more general
259way of defining subsampling, so as to allow more flexibility in
260JPEG-compressed files. But that issue is not addressed in this Tech Note.
261
262Implementors should note that many popular JPEG codecs
263(compressor/decompressors) provide automatic color conversion and
264downsampling, so that the application may supply full-size RGB data which
265is nonetheless converted to downsampled YCbCr. This is an implementation
266convenience which does not excuse the TIFF control layer from its
267responsibility to know what is really going on. The
268PhotometricInterpretation and subsampling fields written to the file must
269describe what is actually in the file.
270
271A JPEG-compressed TIFF file will typically have PhotometricInterpretation =
272YCbCr and YCbCrSubSampling = [2,1] or [2,2], unless the source data was
273grayscale or CMYK.
274
275
276Basic representation of JPEG-compressed images
277----------------------------------------------
278
279JPEG compression works in either strip-based or tile-based TIFF files.
280Rather than repeating "strip or tile" constantly, we will use the term
281"segment" to mean either a strip or a tile.
282
283When the Compression field has the value 7, each image segment contains
284a complete JPEG datastream which is valid according to the ISO JPEG
285standard (ISO/IEC 10918-1). Any sequential JPEG process can be used,
286including lossless JPEG, but progressive and hierarchical processes are not
287supported. Since JPEG is useful only for continuous-tone images, the
288PhotometricInterpretation of the image shall not be 3 (palette color) nor
2894 (transparency mask). The bit depth of the data is also restricted as
290specified below.
291
292Each image segment in a JPEG-compressed TIFF file shall contain a valid
293JPEG datastream according to the ISO JPEG standard's rules for
294interchange-format or abbreviated-image-format data. The datastream shall
295contain a single JPEG frame storing that segment of the image. The
296required JPEG markers within a segment are:
297 SOI (must appear at very beginning of segment)
298 SOFn
299 SOS (one for each scan, if there is more than one scan)
300 EOI (must appear at very end of segment)
301The actual compressed data follows SOS; it may contain RSTn markers if DRI
302is used.
303
304Additional JPEG "tables and miscellaneous" markers may appear between SOI
305and SOFn, between SOFn and SOS, and before each subsequent SOS if there is
306more than one scan. These markers include:
307 DQT
308 DHT
309 DAC (not to appear unless arithmetic coding is used)
310 DRI
311 APPn (shall be ignored by TIFF readers)
312 COM (shall be ignored by TIFF readers)
313DNL markers shall not be used in TIFF files. Readers should abort if any
314other marker type is found, especially the JPEG reserved markers;
315occurrence of such a marker is likely to indicate a JPEG extension.
316
317The tables/miscellaneous markers may appear in any order. Readers are
318cautioned that although the SOFn marker refers to DQT tables, JPEG does not
319require those tables to precede the SOFn, only the SOS. Missing-table
320checks should be made when SOS is reached.
321
322If no JPEGTables field is used, then each image segment shall be a complete
323JPEG interchange datastream. Each segment must define all the tables it
324references. To allow readers to decode segments in any order, no segment
325may rely on tables being carried over from a previous segment.
326
327When a JPEGTables field is used, image segments may omit tables that have
328been specified in the JPEGTables field. Further details appear below.
329
330The SOFn marker shall be of type SOF0 for strict baseline JPEG data, of
331type SOF1 for non-baseline lossy JPEG data, or of type SOF3 for lossless
332JPEG data. (SOF9 or SOF11 would be used for arithmetic coding.) All
333segments of a JPEG-compressed TIFF image shall use the same JPEG
334compression process, in particular the same SOFn type.
335
336The data precision field of the SOFn marker shall agree with the TIFF
337BitsPerSample field. (Note that when PlanarConfiguration=1, this implies
338that all components must have the same BitsPerSample value; when
339PlanarConfiguration=2, different components could have different bit
340depths.) For SOF0 only precision 8 is permitted; for SOF1, precision 8 or
34112 is permitted; for SOF3, precisions 2 to 16 are permitted.
342
343The image dimensions given in the SOFn marker shall agree with the logical
344dimensions of that particular strip or tile. For strip images, the SOFn
345image width shall equal ImageWidth and the height shall equal RowsPerStrip,
346except in the last strip; its SOFn height shall equal the number of rows
347remaining in the ImageLength. (In other words, no padding data is counted
348in the SOFn dimensions.) For tile images, each SOFn shall have width
349TileWidth and height TileHeight; adding and removing any padding needed in
350the edge tiles is the concern of some higher level of the TIFF software.
351(The dimensional rules are slightly different when PlanarConfiguration=2,
352as described below.)
353
354The ISO JPEG standard only permits images up to 65535 pixels in width or
355height, due to 2-byte fields in the SOFn markers. In TIFF, this limits
356the size of an individual JPEG-compressed strip or tile, but the total
357image size can be greater.
358
359The number of components in the JPEG datastream shall equal SamplesPerPixel
360for PlanarConfiguration=1, and shall be 1 for PlanarConfiguration=2. The
361components shall be stored in the same order as they are described at the
362TIFF field level. (This applies both to their order in the SOFn marker,
363and to the order in which they are scanned if multiple JPEG scans are
364used.) The component ID bytes are arbitrary so long as each component
365within an image segment is given a distinct ID. To avoid any possible
366confusion, we require that all segments of a TIFF image use the same ID
367code for a given component.
368
369In PlanarConfiguration 1, the sampling factors given in SOFn markers shall
370agree with the sampling factors defined by the related TIFF fields (or with
371the default values that are specified in the absence of those fields).
372
373When DCT-based JPEG is used in a strip TIFF file, RowsPerStrip is required
374to be a multiple of 8 times the largest vertical sampling factor, i.e., a
375multiple of the height of an interleaved MCU. (For simplicity of
376specification, we require this even if the data is not actually
377interleaved.) For example, if YCbCrSubSampling = [2,2] then RowsPerStrip
378must be a multiple of 16. An exception to this rule is made for
379single-strip images (RowsPerStrip >= ImageLength): the exact value of
380RowsPerStrip is unimportant in that case. This rule ensures that no data
381padding is needed at the bottom of a strip, except perhaps the last strip.
382Any padding required at the right edge of the image, or at the bottom of
383the last strip, is expected to occur internally to the JPEG codec.
384
385When DCT-based JPEG is used in a tiled TIFF file, TileLength is required
386to be a multiple of 8 times the largest vertical sampling factor, i.e.,
387a multiple of the height of an interleaved MCU; and TileWidth is required
388to be a multiple of 8 times the largest horizontal sampling factor, i.e.,
389a multiple of the width of an interleaved MCU. (For simplicity of
390specification, we require this even if the data is not actually
391interleaved.) All edge padding required will therefore occur in the course
392of normal TIFF tile padding; it is not special to JPEG.
393
394Lossless JPEG does not impose these constraints on strip and tile sizes,
395since it is not DCT-based.
396
397Note that within JPEG datastreams, multibyte values appear in the MSB-first
398order specified by the JPEG standard, regardless of the byte ordering of
399the surrounding TIFF file.
400
401
402JPEGTables field
403----------------
404
405The only auxiliary TIFF field added for Compression=7 is the optional
406JPEGTables field. The purpose of JPEGTables is to predefine JPEG
407quantization and/or Huffman tables for subsequent use by JPEG image
408segments. When this is done, these rather bulky tables need not be
409duplicated in each segment, thus saving space and processing time.
410JPEGTables may be used even in a single-segment file, although there is no
411space savings in that case.
412
413JPEGTables:
414 Tag = 347 (15B.H)
415 Type = UNDEFINED
416 N = number of bytes in tables datastream, typically a few hundred
417JPEGTables provides default JPEG quantization and/or Huffman tables which
418are used whenever a segment datastream does not contain its own tables, as
419specified below.
420
421Notice that the JPEGTables field is required to have type code UNDEFINED,
422not type code BYTE. This is to cue readers that expanding individual bytes
423to short or long integers is not appropriate. A TIFF reader will generally
424need to store the field value as an uninterpreted byte sequence until it is
425fed to the JPEG decoder.
426
427Multibyte quantities within the tables follow the ISO JPEG convention of
428MSB-first storage, regardless of the byte ordering of the surrounding TIFF
429file.
430
431When the JPEGTables field is present, it shall contain a valid JPEG
432"abbreviated table specification" datastream. This datastream shall begin
433with SOI and end with EOI. It may contain zero or more JPEG "tables and
434miscellaneous" markers, namely:
435 DQT
436 DHT
437 DAC (not to appear unless arithmetic coding is used)
438 DRI
439 APPn (shall be ignored by TIFF readers)
440 COM (shall be ignored by TIFF readers)
441Since JPEG defines the SOI marker to reset the DAC and DRI state, these two
442markers' values cannot be carried over into any image datastream, and thus
443they are effectively no-ops in the JPEGTables field. To avoid confusion,
444it is recommended that writers not place DAC or DRI markers in JPEGTables.
445However readers must properly skip over them if they appear.
446
447When JPEGTables is present, readers shall load the table specifications
448contained in JPEGTables before processing image segment datastreams.
449Image segments may simply refer to these preloaded tables without defining
450them. An image segment can still define and use its own tables, subject to
451the restrictions below.
452
453An image segment may not redefine any table defined in JPEGTables. (This
454restriction is imposed to allow readers to process image segments in random
455order without having to reload JPEGTables between segments.) Therefore, use
456of JPEGTables divides the available table slots into two groups: "global"
457slots are defined in JPEGTables and may be used but not redefined by
458segments; "local" slots are available for local definition and use in each
459segment. To permit random access, a segment may not reference any local
460tables that it does not itself define.
461
462
463Special considerations for PlanarConfiguration 2
464------------------------------------------------
465
466In PlanarConfiguration 2, each image segment contains data for only one
467color component. To avoid confusing the JPEG codec, we wish the segments
468to look like valid single-channel (i.e., grayscale) JPEG datastreams. This
469means that different rules must be used for the SOFn parameters.
470
471In PlanarConfiguration 2, the dimensions given in the SOFn of a subsampled
472component shall be scaled down by the sampling factors compared to the SOFn
473dimensions that would be used in PlanarConfiguration 1. This is necessary
474to match the actual number of samples stored in that segment, so that the
475JPEG codec doesn't complain about too much or too little data. In strip
476TIFF files the computed dimensions may need to be rounded up to the next
477integer; in tiled files, the restrictions on tile size make this case
478impossible.
479
480Furthermore, all SOFn sampling factors shall be given as 1. (This is
481merely to avoid confusion, since the sampling factors in a single-channel
482JPEG datastream have no real effect.)
483
484Any downsampling will need to happen externally to the JPEG codec, since
485JPEG sampling factors are defined with reference to the full-precision
486component. In PlanarConfiguration 2, the JPEG codec will be working on
487only one component at a time and thus will have no reference component to
488downsample against.
489
490
491Minimum requirements for TIFF/JPEG
492----------------------------------
493
494ISO JPEG is a large and complex standard; most implementations support only
495a subset of it. Here we define a "core" subset of TIFF/JPEG which readers
496must support to claim TIFF/JPEG compatibility. For maximum
497cross-application compatibility, we recommend that writers confine
498themselves to this subset unless there is very good reason to do otherwise.
499
500Use the ISO baseline JPEG process: 8-bit data precision, Huffman coding,
501with no more than 2 DC and 2 AC Huffman tables. Note that this implies
502BitsPerSample = 8 for each component. We recommend deviating from baseline
503JPEG only if 12-bit data precision or lossless coding is required.
504
505Use no subsampling (all JPEG sampling factors = 1) for color spaces other
506than YCbCr. (This is, in fact, required with the TIFF 6.0 field
507definitions, but may not be so in future revisions.) For YCbCr, use one of
508the following choices:
509 YCbCrSubSampling field JPEG sampling factors
510 1,1 1h1v, 1h1v, 1h1v
511 2,1 2h1v, 1h1v, 1h1v
512 2,2 (default value) 2h2v, 1h1v, 1h1v
513We recommend that RGB source data be converted to YCbCr for best compression
514results. Other source data colorspaces should probably be left alone.
515Minimal readers need not support JPEG images with colorspaces other than
516YCbCr and grayscale (PhotometricInterpretation = 6 or 1).
517
518A minimal reader also need not support JPEG YCbCr images with nondefault
519values of YCbCrCoefficients or YCbCrPositioning, nor with values of
520ReferenceBlackWhite other than [0,255,128,255,128,255]. (These values
521correspond to the RGB<=>YCbCr conversion specified by JFIF, which is widely
522implemented in JPEG codecs.)
523
524Writers are reminded that a ReferenceBlackWhite field *must* be included
525when PhotometricInterpretation is YCbCr, because the default
526ReferenceBlackWhite values are inappropriate for YCbCr.
527
528If any subsampling is used, PlanarConfiguration=1 is preferred to avoid the
529possibly-confusing requirements of PlanarConfiguration=2. In any case,
530readers are not required to support PlanarConfiguration=2.
531
532If possible, use a single interleaved scan in each image segment. This is
533not legal JPEG if there are more than 4 SamplesPerPixel or if the sampling
534factors are such that more than 10 blocks would be needed per MCU; in that
535case, use a separate scan for each component. (The recommended color
536spaces and sampling factors will not run into that restriction, so a
537minimal reader need not support more than one scan per segment.)
538
539To claim TIFF/JPEG compatibility, readers shall support multiple-strip TIFF
540files and the optional JPEGTables field; it is not acceptable to read only
541single-datastream files. Support for tiled TIFF files is strongly
542recommended but not required.
543
544
545Other recommendations for implementors
546--------------------------------------
547
548The TIFF tag Compression=7 guarantees only that the compressed data is
549represented as ISO JPEG datastreams. Since JPEG is a large and evolving
550standard, readers should apply careful error checking to the JPEG markers
551to ensure that the compression process is within their capabilities. In
552particular, to avoid being confused by future extensions to the JPEG
553standard, it is important to abort if unknown marker codes are seen.
554
555The point of requiring that all image segments use the same JPEG process is
556to ensure that a reader need check only one segment to determine whether it
557can handle the image. For example, consider a TIFF reader that has access
558to fast but restricted JPEG hardware, as well as a slower, more general
559software implementation. It is desirable to check only one image segment
560to find out whether the fast hardware can be used. Thus, writers should
561try to ensure that all segments of an image look as much "alike" as
562possible: there should be no variation in scan layout, use of options such
563as DRI, etc. Ideally, segments will be processed identically except
564perhaps for using different local quantization or entropy-coding tables.
565
566Writers should avoid including "noise" JPEG markers (COM and APPn markers).
567Standard TIFF fields provide a better way to transport any non-image data.
568Some JPEG codecs may change behavior if they see an APPn marker they
569think they understand; since the TIFF spec requires these markers to be
570ignored, this behavior is undesirable.
571
572It is possible to convert an interchange-JPEG file (e.g., a JFIF file) to
573TIFF simply by dropping the interchange datastream into a single strip.
574(However, designers are reminded that the TIFF spec discourages huge
575strips; splitting the image is somewhat more work but may give better
576results.) Conversion from TIFF to interchange JPEG is more complex. A
577strip-based TIFF/JPEG file can be converted fairly easily if all strips use
578identical JPEG tables and no RSTn markers: just delete the overhead markers
579and insert RSTn markers between strips. Converting tiled images is harder,
580since the data will usually not be in the right order (unless the tiles are
581only one MCU high). This can still be done losslessly, but it will require
582undoing and redoing the entropy coding so that the DC coefficient
583differences can be updated.
584
585There is no default value for JPEGTables: standard TIFF files must define all
586tables that they reference. For some closed systems in which many files will
587have identical tables, it might make sense to define a default JPEGTables
588value to avoid actually storing the tables. Or even better, invent a
589private field selecting one of N default JPEGTables settings, so as to allow
590for future expansion. Either of these must be regarded as a private
591extension that will render the files unreadable by other applications.
592
593
594References
595----------
596
597[1] Wallace, Gregory K. "The JPEG Still Picture Compression Standard",
598Communications of the ACM, April 1991 (vol. 34 no. 4), pp. 30-44.
599
600This is the best short technical introduction to the JPEG algorithms.
601It is a good overview but does not provide sufficiently detailed
602information to write an implementation.
603
604[2] Pennebaker, William B. and Mitchell, Joan L. "JPEG Still Image Data
605Compression Standard", Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1993, ISBN 0-442-01272-1.
606638pp.
607
608This textbook is by far the most complete exposition of JPEG in existence.
609It includes the full text of the ISO JPEG standards (DIS 10918-1 and draft
610DIS 10918-2). No would-be JPEG implementor should be without it.
611
612[3] ISO/IEC IS 10918-1, "Digital Compression and Coding of Continuous-tone
613Still Images, Part 1: Requirements and guidelines", February 1994.
614ISO/IEC DIS 10918-2, "Digital Compression and Coding of Continuous-tone
615Still Images, Part 2: Compliance testing", final approval expected 1994.
616
617These are the official standards documents. Note that the Pennebaker and
618Mitchell textbook is likely to be cheaper and more useful than the official
619standards.
620
621
622Changes to Section 21: YCbCr Images
623===================================
624
625[This section of the Tech Note clarifies section 21 to make clear the
626interpretation of image dimensions in a subsampled image. Furthermore,
627the section is changed to allow the original image dimensions not to be
628multiples of the sampling factors. This change is necessary to support use
629of JPEG compression on odd-size images.]
630
631Add the following paragraphs to the Section 21 introduction (p. 89),
632just after the paragraph beginning "When a Class Y image is subsampled":
633
634 In a subsampled image, it is understood that all TIFF image
635 dimensions are measured in terms of the highest-resolution
636 (luminance) component. In particular, ImageWidth, ImageLength,
637 RowsPerStrip, TileWidth, TileLength, XResolution, and YResolution
638 are measured in luminance samples.
639
640 RowsPerStrip, TileWidth, and TileLength are constrained so that
641 there are an integral number of samples of each component in a
642 complete strip or tile. However, ImageWidth/ImageLength are not
643 constrained. If an odd-size image is to be converted to subsampled
644 format, the writer should pad the source data to a multiple of the
645 sampling factors by replication of the last column and/or row, then
646 downsample. The number of luminance samples actually stored in the
647 file will be a multiple of the sampling factors. Conversely,
648 readers must ignore any extra data (outside the specified image
649 dimensions) after upsampling.
650
651 When PlanarConfiguration=2, each strip or tile covers the same
652 image area despite subsampling; that is, the total number of strips
653 or tiles in the image is the same for each component. Therefore
654 strips or tiles of the subsampled components contain fewer samples
655 than strips or tiles of the luminance component.
656
657 If there are extra samples per pixel (see field ExtraSamples),
658 these data channels have the same number of samples as the
659 luminance component.
660
661Rewrite the YCbCrSubSampling field description (pp 91-92) as follows
662(largely to eliminate possibly-misleading references to
663ImageWidth/ImageLength of the subsampled components):
664
665 (first paragraph unchanged)
666
667 The two elements of this field are defined as follows:
668
669 Short 0: ChromaSubsampleHoriz:
670
671 1 = there are equal numbers of luma and chroma samples horizontally.
672
673 2 = there are twice as many luma samples as chroma samples
674 horizontally.
675
676 4 = there are four times as many luma samples as chroma samples
677 horizontally.
678
679 Short 1: ChromaSubsampleVert:
680
681 1 = there are equal numbers of luma and chroma samples vertically.
682
683 2 = there are twice as many luma samples as chroma samples
684 vertically.
685
686 4 = there are four times as many luma samples as chroma samples
687 vertically.
688
689 ChromaSubsampleVert shall always be less than or equal to
690 ChromaSubsampleHoriz. Note that Cb and Cr have the same sampling
691 ratios.
692
693 In a strip TIFF file, RowsPerStrip is required to be an integer
694 multiple of ChromaSubSampleVert (unless RowsPerStrip >=
695 ImageLength, in which case its exact value is unimportant).
696 If ImageWidth and ImageLength are not multiples of
697 ChromaSubsampleHoriz and ChromaSubsampleVert respectively, then the
698 source data shall be padded to the next integer multiple of these
699 values before downsampling.
700
701 In a tiled TIFF file, TileWidth must be an integer multiple of
702 ChromaSubsampleHoriz and TileLength must be an integer multiple of
703 ChromaSubsampleVert. Padding will occur to tile boundaries.
704
705 The default values of this field are [ 2,2 ]. Thus, YCbCr data is
706 downsampled by default!
707</pre>