Document WG1N78005
JPEG explores blockchain in its standards
The JPEG Committee had its 78th meeting in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Relevant to its ongoing standardization efforts in JPEG Privacy and Security, JPEG organized a special session to explore how to support blockchain and distributed ledger technologies to past, ongoing and future JPEG family of standards. This is motivated by the fact that considering the potential impact of such technologies in the future of multimedia, standardization will be required to enable inter-operability between different systems and services of imaging relying on blockchain and distributed ledger technologies.
The following summarizes various highlights during JPEG’s Rio de Janeiro meeting.
JPEG explores blockchain and distributed ledger technologies
During the 78th JPEG meeting in Rio de Janeiro, the JPEG committee organized a special session on blockchain and distributed ledger technologies and their impact on JPEG standards. As a result, the committee decided to explore use cases and standardization needs related to blockchain technology in a multimedia context. Use cases will be explored in relation to the recently launched JPEG Privacy and Security, as well as in the broader landscape of imaging and multimedia applications. To that end, the committee created an ad hoc group with the aim to gather input from experts to define these use cases and to explore eventual needs and advantages to support a standardization effort focused on imaging and multimedia applications. To get involved in the discussion, interested parties can register to the ad hoc group’s mailing list.
JPEG 360 Metadata
The JPEG Committee notes the increasing use of multi-sensor images from multi-sensor devices, such as 360 degree capturing cameras or dual-camera smartphones available to consumers. Images from these cameras are shown on computers, smartphones, and Head Mounted Displays (HMDs). JPEG standards are commonly used for image compression and file format. However, because existing JPEG standards do not fully cover these new uses, incompatibilities have reduced the interoperability of their images, and thus reducing the widespread ubiquity, which consumers have come to expect when using JPEG files. Additionally, new modalities for interacting with images, such as computer-based augmentation, face-tagging, and object classification, require support for metadata that was not part of the original scope of JPEG. A set of such JPEG 360 use cases is described in JPEG 360 Metadata Use Cases document.
To avoid fragmentation in the market and to ensure wide interoperability, a standard way of interacting with multi-sensor images with richer metadata is desired in JPEG standards. JPEG invites all interested parties, including manufacturers, vendors and users of such devices to submit technology proposals for enabling interactions with multi-sensor images and metadata that fulfill the scope, objectives and requirements that are outlined in the final Call for Proposals, available on the JPEG website.
To stay posted on JPEG 360, please regularly consult our website at jpeg.org and/or subscribe to the JPEG 360 e-mail reflector.
JPEG XL
The Next-Generation Image Compression activity (JPEG XL) has produced a revised draft Call for Proposals, and intends to publish a final Call for Proposals (CfP) following its 79th meeting (April 2018), with the objective of seeking technologies that fulfill the objectives and scope of the Next-Generation Image Compression. During the 78th meeting, objective and subjective quality assessment methodologies for anchor and proposal evaluations were discussed and analyzed. As outcome of the meeting, source code for objective quality assessment has been made available.
The draft Call for Proposals, with all related info, can be found on the JPEG website. Comments are welcome and should be submitted as specified in the document. To stay posted on the action plan for JPEG XL, please regularly consult our website at jpeg.org and/or subscribe to our e-mail reflector.
JPEG XS
Since its previous 77th meeting, subjective quality evaluations have shown that the initial quality requirement of the JPEG XS Core Coding System has been met, i.e. a visually lossless quality at a compression ratio of 6:1 for large majority of images under test has been met. Several profiles are now under development in JPEG XS, as well as transport and container formats. JPEG committee therefore invites interested parties - in particular coding experts, codec providers, system integrators and potential users of the foreseen solutions - to contribute to the furthering of the specifications in the above directions. Publication of the International Standard is expected for Q3 2018.
JPEG Pleno
JPEG Pleno activity is currently divided into Pleno Light Field, Pleno Point Cloud and Pleno Holography. JPEG Pleno Light Field has been preparing a third round of core experiments for assessing the impact of individual coding modules on the overall rate-distortion performance. Moreover, it was decided to pursue with collecting additional test data, and progress with the preparation of working documents for JPEG Pleno specifications Part 1 and Part 2.
Furthermore, quality modelling studies are under consideration for both JPEG Pleno Point Clouds, and JPEG Pleno Holography. In particular, JPEG Pleno Point Cloud is considering a set of new quality metrics provided as contributions to this work item. It is expected that the new metrics replace the current state of the art as they have shown superior correlation with subjective quality as perceived by humans. Moreover, new subjective assessment models have been tested and analysed to better understand the perception of quality for such new types of visual information.
JPEG Reference Software
The JPEG committee is pleased to announce that its first JPEG image coding specifications is now augmented by a new part, ISO/IEC 10918-7, that contains a reference software. The proposed candidate software implementations have been checked for compliance with 10918-2. Considering the positive results, this new part of the JPEG standard will continue to evolve quickly.
JPEG 25th anniversary of the first JPEG standard
JPEG’s first standard third and final 25th anniversary celebration is planned at its next 79th JPEG meeting taking place in La Jolla, CA, USA. The anniversary will be marked by a 2 hours workshop on Friday 13th April on current and emerging JPEG technologies, followed by a social event where past JPEG committee members with relevant contributions will be awarded.
"Blockchain and distributed ledger technologies promise a significant impact on the future of many fields. JPEG is committed to provide standard mechanisms to apply blockchain on multimedia applications in general and on imaging in particular.” said Prof. Touradj Ebrahimi, the Convenor of the JPEG Committee.
About JPEG
The Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPEG) is a Working Group of ISO/IEC, the International Organisation for Standardization / International Electrotechnical Commission, (ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 1) and of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU-T SG16), responsible for the popular JBIG, JPEG, JPEG 2000, JPEG XR, JPSearch and more recently, the JPEG XT, JPEG XS, JPEG Systems and JPEG Pleno families of imaging standards.
The JPEG Committee meets nominally four times a year, in different world locations. The latest 78th meeting was held from January 27th to February 2nd 2018, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The next 79th JPEG Meeting will be held on 9-15 April 2018, in La Jolla, California, USA.
More information about JPEG and its work is available at jpeg.org or by contacting of the JPEG Communication Subgroup.
If you would like to stay posted on JPEG activities, please subscribe to the jpeg-news mailing list.
A zip package containing the official JPEG logo and logos of all JPEG standards can be downloaded here.
Future JPEG meetings are planned as follows:
- No 79, La Jolla (San Diego), CA, USA, April 9 to 15, 2018
- No 80, Berlin, Germany, July 7 to13, 2018
- No 81, Vancouver, Canada, October 13 to 19, 2018