BCR’s CDP Digital Imaging Best Practices, Version 2.0

This is the published version.These Best Practices — also referred to as the CDP Best Practices -- have been created through the collaboration of working groups pulled from library, museum and archive practitioners. Version 1 was created through funding from the Institute for Museum and Library Services through a grant to the University of Denver and the Colorado Digitization Program in 2003. Version 2 of the guidelines were published by BCR in 2008 and represents a significant update of practices under the leadership of their CDP Digital Imaging Best Practices Working Group. The intent has been to help standardize and share protocols governing the implementation of digital projects. The result of these collaborations is a set of best practice documents that cover issues such as digital imaging, Dublin Core metadata and digital audio. These best practice documents are intended to help with the design and implementation of digitization projects. Because they were collaboratively designed by experts in the field, you can be certain they include the best possible information, in addition to having been field tested and proven in practice. These best practice documents are an ongoing collaborative project, and LYRASIS will add information and new documents as they are developed

A study and some experimental work of digital image and video watermarking

The rapid growth of digitized media and the emergence of digital networks have created a pressing need for copyright protection and anonymous communications schemes. Digital watermarking (or data hiding in a more general term) is a kind of steganography technique by adding information into a digital data stream. Several most important watermarking schemes applied to multilevel and binary still images and digital videos were studied. They include schemes based on DCT (Discrete Cosine Transform), DWT (Discrete Wavelet Transform), and fractal transforms. The question whether these invisible watermarking techniques can resolve the issue of rightful ownership of intellectual properties was discussed. The watermarking schemes were further studied from malicious attack point of view, which is considered an effective way to advance the watermarking techniques. In particular, the StirMark robustness tests based on geometrical distortion were carried out. A binary watermarking scheme applied in the DCT domain is presented in this research project. The effect of the binarization procedure necessarily encountered in dealing with binary document images is found so strong that most of conventional embedding schemes fail in dealing with watermarking of binary document images. Some particular measures have to be taken. The initial simulation results indicate that the proposed technique is promising though further efforts need to be made

Data hiding in multimedia - theory and applications

Multimedia data hiding or steganography is a means of communication using subliminal channels. The resource for the subliminal communication scheme is the distortion of the original content that can be tolerated. This thesis addresses two main issues of steganographic communication schemes: 1. How does one maximize the distortion introduced without affecting fidelity of the content? 2. How does one efficiently utilize the resource (the distortion introduced) for communicating as many bits of information as possible? In other words, what is a good signaling strategy for the subliminal communication scheme? Close to optimal solutions for both issues are analyzed. Many techniques for the issue for maximizing the resource, viz, the distortion introduced imperceptibly in images and video frames, are proposed. Different signaling strategies for steganographic communication are explored, and a novel signaling technique employing a floating signal constellation is proposed. Algorithms for optimal choices of the parameters of the signaling technique are presented. Other application specific issues like the type of robustness needed are taken into consideration along with the established theoretical background to design optimal data hiding schemes. In particular, two very important applications of data hiding are addressed - data hiding for multimedia content delivery, and data hiding for watermarking (for proving ownership). A robust watermarking protocol for unambiguous resolution of ownership is proposed

Framework for Automatic Identification of Paper Watermarks with Chain Codes

Title from PDF of title page viewed May 21, 2018Dissertation advisor: Reza DerakhshaniVitaIncludes bibliographical references (pages 220-235)Thesis (Ph.D.)--School of Computing and Engineering. University of Missouri--Kansas City, 2017In this dissertation, I present a new framework for automated description, archiving, and identification of paper watermarks found in historical documents and manuscripts. The early manufacturers of paper have introduced the embedding of identifying marks and patterns as a sign of a distinct origin and perhaps as a signature of quality. Thousands of watermarks have been studied, classified, and archived. Most of the classification categories are based on image similarity and are searchable based on a set of defined contextual descriptors. The novel method presented here is for automatic classification, identification (matching) and retrieval of watermark images based on chain code descriptors (CC). The approach for generation of unique CC includes a novel image preprocessing method to provide a solution for rotation and scale invariant representation of watermarks. The unique codes are truly reversible, providing high ratio lossless compression, fast searching, and image matching. The development of a novel distance measure for CC comparison is also presented. Examples for the complete process are given using the recently acquired watermarks digitized with hyper-spectral imaging of Summa Theologica, the work of Antonino Pierozzi (1389 – 1459). The performance of the algorithm on large datasets is demonstrated using watermarks datasets from well-known library catalogue collections.Introduction -- Paper and paper watermarks -- Automatic identification of paper watermarks -- Rotation, Scale and translation invariant chain code -- Comparison of RST_Invariant chain code -- Automatic identification of watermarks with chain codes -- Watermark composite feature vector -- Summary -- Appendix A. Watermarks from the Bernstein Collection used in this study -- Appendix B. The original and transformed images of watermarks -- Appendix C. The transformed and scaled images of watermarks -- Appendix D. Example of chain cod

Digital watermarking and novel security devices

EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

Study and Implementation of Watermarking Algorithms

Water Making is the process of embedding data called a watermark into a multimedia object such that watermark can be detected or extracted later to make an assertion about the object. The object may be an audio, image or video. A copy of a digital image is identical to the original. This has in many instances, led to the use of digital content with malicious intent. One way to protect multimedia data against illegal recording and retransmission is to embed a signal, called digital signature or copyright label or watermark that authenticates the owner of the data. Data hiding, schemes to embed secondary data in digital media, have made considerable progress in recent years and attracted attention from both academia and industry. Techniques have been proposed for a variety of applications, including ownership protection, authentication and access control. Imperceptibility, robustness against moderate processing such as compression, and the ability to hide many bits are the basic but rat..

Comparative evaluation of video watermarking techniques in the uncompressed domain

Thesis (MScEng)--Stellenbosch University, 2012.ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Electronic watermarking is a method whereby information can be imperceptibly embedded into electronic media, while ideally being robust against common signal manipulations and intentional attacks to remove the embedded watermark. This study evaluates the characteristics of uncompressed video watermarking techniques in terms of visual characteristics, computational complexity and robustness against attacks and signal manipulations. The foundations of video watermarking are reviewed, followed by a survey of existing video watermarking techniques. Representative techniques from different watermarking categories are identified, implemented and evaluated. Existing image quality metrics are reviewed and extended to improve their performance when comparing these video watermarking techniques. A new metric for the evaluation of inter frame flicker in video sequences is then developed. A technique for possibly improving the robustness of the implemented discrete Fourier transform technique against rotation is then proposed. It is also shown that it is possible to reduce the computational complexity of watermarking techniques without affecting the quality of the original content, through a modified watermark embedding method. Possible future studies are then recommended with regards to further improving watermarking techniques against rotation.AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: ’n Elektroniese watermerk is ’n metode waardeur inligting onmerkbaar in elektroniese media vasgelê kan word, met die doel dat dit bestand is teen algemene manipulasies en doelbewuste pogings om die watermerk te verwyder. In hierdie navorsing word die eienskappe van onsaamgeperste video watermerktegnieke ondersoek in terme van visuele eienskappe, berekeningskompleksiteit en weerstandigheid teen aanslae en seinmanipulasies. Die onderbou van video watermerktegnieke word bestudeer, gevolg deur ’n oorsig van reedsbestaande watermerktegnieke. Verteenwoordigende tegnieke vanuit verskillende watermerkkategorieë word geïdentifiseer, geïmplementeer en geëvalueer. Bestaande metodes vir die evaluering van beeldkwaliteite word bestudeer en uitgebrei om die werkverrigting van die tegnieke te verbeter, spesifiek vir die vergelyking van watermerktegnieke. ’n Nuwe stelsel vir die evaluering van tussenraampie flikkering in video’s word ook ontwikkel. ’n Tegniek vir die moontlike verbetering van die geïmplementeerde diskrete Fourier transform tegniek word voorgestel om die tegniek se bestandheid teen rotasie te verbeter. Daar word ook aangetoon dat dit moontlik is om die berekeningskompleksiteit van watermerktegnieke te verminder, sonder om die kwaliteit van die oorspronklike inhoud te beïnvloed, deur die gebruik van ’n verbeterde watermerkvasleggingsmetode. Laastens word aanbevelings vir verdere navorsing aangaande die verbetering van watermerktegnieke teen rotasie gemaak

Reduced reference image and video quality assessments: review of methods

With the growing demand for image and video-based applications, the requirements of consistent quality assessment metrics of image and video have increased. Different approaches have been proposed in the literature to estimate the perceptual quality of images and videos. These approaches can be divided into three main categories; full reference (FR), reduced reference (RR) and no-reference (NR). In RR methods, instead of providing the original image or video as a reference, we need to provide certain features (i.e., texture, edges, etc.) of the original image or video for quality assessment. During the last decade, RR-based quality assessment has been a popular research area for a variety of applications such as social media, online games, and video streaming. In this paper, we present review and classification of the latest research work on RR-based image and video quality assessment. We have also summarized different databases used in the field of 2D and 3D image and video quality assessment. This paper would be helpful for specialists and researchers to stay well-informed about recent progress of RR-based image and video quality assessment. The review and classification presented in this paper will also be useful to gain understanding of multimedia quality assessment and state-of-the-art approaches used for the analysis. In addition, it will help the reader select appropriate quality assessment methods and parameters for their respective applications

Reduced reference image and video quality assessments: review of methods

With the growing demand for image and video-based applications, the requirements of consistent quality assessment metrics of image and video have increased. Different approaches have been proposed in the literature to estimate the perceptual quality of images and videos. These approaches can be divided into three main categories; full reference (FR), reduced reference (RR) and no-reference (NR). In RR methods, instead of providing the original image or video as a reference, we need to provide certain features (i.e., texture, edges, etc.) of the original image or video for quality assessment. During the last decade, RR-based quality assessment has been a popular research area for a variety of applications such as social media, online games, and video streaming. In this paper, we present review and classification of the latest research work on RR-based image and video quality assessment. We have also summarized different databases used in the field of 2D and 3D image and video quality assessment. This paper would be helpful for specialists and researchers to stay well-informed about recent progress of RR-based image and video quality assessment. The review and classification presented in this paper will also be useful to gain understanding of multimedia quality assessment and state-of-the-art approaches used for the analysis. In addition, it will help the reader select appropriate quality assessment methods and parameters for their respective applications

Cyber Law and Espionage Law as Communicating Vessels

Professor Lubin\u27s contribution is Cyber Law and Espionage Law as Communicating Vessels, pp. 203-225. Existing legal literature would have us assume that espionage operations and “below-the-threshold” cyber operations are doctrinally distinct. Whereas one is subject to the scant, amorphous, and under-developed legal framework of espionage law, the other is subject to an emerging, ever-evolving body of legal rules, known cumulatively as cyber law. This dichotomy, however, is erroneous and misleading. In practice, espionage and cyber law function as communicating vessels, and so are better conceived as two elements of a complex system, Information Warfare (IW). This paper therefore first draws attention to the similarities between the practices – the fact that the actors, technologies, and targets are interchangeable, as are the knee-jerk legal reactions of the international community. In light of the convergence between peacetime Low-Intensity Cyber Operations (LICOs) and peacetime Espionage Operations (EOs) the two should be subjected to a single regulatory framework, one which recognizes the role intelligence plays in our public world order and which adopts a contextual and consequential method of inquiry. The paper proceeds in the following order: Part 2 provides a descriptive account of the unique symbiotic relationship between espionage and cyber law, and further explains the reasons for this dynamic. Part 3 places the discussion surrounding this relationship within the broader discourse on IW, making the claim that the convergence between EOs and LICOs, as described in Part 2, could further be explained by an even larger convergence across all the various elements of the informational environment. Parts 2 and 3 then serve as the backdrop for Part 4, which details the attempt of the drafters of the Tallinn Manual 2.0 to compartmentalize espionage law and cyber law, and the deficits of their approach. The paper concludes by proposing an alternative holistic understanding of espionage law, grounded in general principles of law, which is more practically transferable to the cyber realmhttps://www.repository.law.indiana.edu/facbooks/1220/thumbnail.jp