6. Some applications

6.1 Image compression

The application field in which wavelets have undoubtedly had the greatest impact is image compression [6] . This is largely due to the excellent compression performance achieved by wavelet-based algorithms. Another reason for this success is the introduction of scalability features in terms of resolution and quality, which will be discussed later.

The improvement in coding efficiency over DPCM (Differentially Coded Pulse Modulation) or DCT (Discrete Cosine Transform) schemes is due to the better concentration of energy achieved by wavelet decompositions and the absence of "block effects". Another gain factor is the development of compression algorithms capable of efficiently...