ABSTRACT
The original treatise by C. E. Shannon [1] in 1948 \vas the first to mathematically define the amount of inforlnation present in a source and laid the foundation for information theory. This theory introduced sOlne fundamental limits \vithin \yhich cOlnmunication can take place. It is on this theory that source coding is based. Source coding, also kno\vn as data c01l1pression, is the process by which redundant information from a source is removed resulting in a saving in terms of space and bandwidth. The information can be reconstructed to some fidelity criterion by a reverse process kllo\vn as source decoding, or data decolnpression. \Vhen source coding is applied to images or sequences of images, it is known as image or video compression respectively. Applications that rely on ilnage compression include video conferencing applications, fingerprint image storage, and storage and transmission of video movies.
