An efficient fractal image coding algorithm using unified feature and DCT

Fractal image compression is a promising technique to improve the efficiency of image storage and image transmission with high compression ratio, however, the huge time consumption for the fractal image coding is a great obstacle to the practical applications. In order to improve the fractal image coding, efficient fractal image coding algorithms using a special unified feature and a DCT coder are proposed in this paper. Firstly, based on a necessary condition to the best matching search rule during fractal image coding, the fast algorithm using a special unified feature (UFC) is addressed, and it can reduce the search space obviously and exclude most inappropriate matching subblocks before the best matching search. Secondly, on the basis of UFC algorithm, in order to improve the quality of the reconstructed image, a DCT coder is combined to construct a hybrid fractal image algorithm (DUFC). Experimental results show that the proposed algorithms can obtain good quality of the reconstructed images and need much less time than the baseline fractal coding algorithm.