Nonlinear Wavelet Transforms for Image Coding via Lifting

We investigate central issues such as invertibility, stability, synchronization, and frequency characteristics for non-linear wavelet transforms built using the lifting framework. The non-linearity comes from adaptively choosing between a class of linear predictors within the lifting framework. We also describe how earlier families of non-linear filter banks can be extended through the use of prediction functions operating on a causal neighborhood of pixels. Preliminary compression results and real-world images demonstrate the promise of our techniques.