Real-time lossless compression of depth streams

An apparatus for real-time lossless compression, comprising:

• imaging circuitry configured to capture one or more depth images;
• and
• processing circuitry comprising a processor and memory storing a Z-lossless (ZLS) compression application that, when executed by the processor, causes the processing circuitry to:
• generate compacted depth information Iij by condensing information of a captured depth image and a compressed binary representation of the captured depth image using histogram compaction;
• apply a spatial prediction to the compacted depth information Iij to generate predictions πij;
• removing the predictions πij from the compacted depth information Iij to produce a group of residuals ρij′;
• and
• generate an output stream based upon the group of residuals ρij′,
• wherein generating the compacted depth information comprises:
• identifying leading 1-bits and truncates in the group of residuals ρij′ of depth image data, the group of residuals in binary format comprising a plurality of bitplanes;
• determining a verbatim truncate series from the truncates identified in the group of residuals;
• and
• determining a 0-run sequence for individual bitplanes of the plurality of bitplanes based upon the leading 1-bits identified in the group of residuals.