Image encoding with dynamic buffer-capacity-level-based compression adjustment

A system for processing an image, comprising:

• a forward transform module configured to sequentially generate frequency domain vectors from a sequence of blocks of the image, wherein each frequency domain vector comprises a set of forward transform coefficients derived from a respective image block;
• a quantizer module configured to sequentially generate quantized frequency domain vectors from the frequency domain vectors generated by the forward transform module;
• a dynamic compression adjustment module configured to, for each successive quantized frequency domain vector, determine a current input capacity level of a buffer and to modify the quantized frequency domain vector to increase compressibility when the current input capacity level is determined to be below a prescribed threshold;
• encoder module configured to encode modified and unmodified quantized frequency domain vectors into a sequence of encoded image blocks and to store the sequence of encoded image blocks in the buffer.

A computer readable storage medium including a program for processing an image, the computer program residing on a computer-readable medium and comprising computer-readable instructions for causing a computer to:

• sequentially generate quantized frequency domain vectors from a sequence of blocks of the image, wherein each quantized frequency domain vector comprises a set of quantized forward transform coefficients derived from a respective image block;
• for each successive quantized frequency domain vector, determine a current input capacity level of a buffer and modify the quantized frequency domain vector to increase compressibility when the current input capacity level is determined to be below a prescribed threshold;
• encode modified and unmodified quantized frequency domain vectors into a sequence of encoded image blocks;
• and
• store the sequence of encoded image blocks in the buffer.