{"id":299,"date":"2009-11-11T15:31:18","date_gmt":"2009-11-11T15:31:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.mathworks.com\/steve\/2009\/11\/11\/im-looking-for-a-replacement-for-truecolor\/"},"modified":"2009-11-11T15:31:18","modified_gmt":"2009-11-11T15:31:18","slug":"im-looking-for-a-replacement-for-truecolor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.mathworks.com\/steve\/2009\/11\/11\/im-looking-for-a-replacement-for-truecolor\/","title":{"rendered":"I&#8217;m looking for a replacement for &#8220;truecolor&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<div xmlns:mwsh=\"https:\/\/www.mathworks.com\/namespace\/mcode\/v1\/syntaxhighlight.dtd\" class=\"content\">\r\n   <p>The Image Processing Toolbox has terminology conventions for four different image types:<\/p>\r\n   <div>\r\n      <ul>\r\n         <li>Binary images<\/li>\r\n         <li>Gray-scale images<\/li>\r\n         <li>Indexed images<\/li>\r\n         <li>Truecolor images<\/li>\r\n      <\/ul>\r\n   <\/div>\r\n   <p>You'll also frequently see the term <i>RGB image<\/i>, which is shorthand for a truecolor image using an RGB color space.  (See the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mathworks.com\/help\/releases\/R2009b\/toolbox\/images\/f14-13543.html\">User Guide section on image types<\/a>.)\r\n   <\/p>\r\n   <p>Over the last few years I've become increasingly dissatisfied with the term <i>truecolor<\/i>.\r\n   <\/p>\r\n   <p>Wikipedia has a <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Truecolor\">brief article on truecolor<\/a>.  The article says the term describes a \"method of representing and storing graphical image information.\"  It goes on to\r\n      say that a truecolor representation is one that either:\r\n   <\/p>\r\n   <p>(a) can represent a large number of colors, typically at least 2^24.<\/p>\r\n   <p>(b) does not use a color look-up table (\"colormap\" in MATLAB terminology)<\/p>\r\n   <p>Curiously, the article refers to (a) and (b) as \"equivalent\" statements.<\/p>\r\n   <p>Defining an image representation method in terms of whether it represents a lot of colors is too vague to be very useful in\r\n      my view. Defining a representation in terms of a characteristic it does not possess (that is, a truecolor representation does\r\n      not use a color look-up table) is similarly vague.\r\n   <\/p>\r\n   <p>Also, as I learn more about color science I've grown uncomfortable with the idea that any computer or mathematical representation\r\n      of color can really be called \"true color.\"\r\n   <\/p>\r\n   <p>Here's the definition I really want to see:<\/p>\r\n   <p><i><b>[blank]<\/b> is a method of representing image information in which each image pixel is stored as a vector of color-space component values.<\/i><\/p>\r\n   <p>But what's a good term to go along with this definition? Help me fill in the blank by commenting with your thoughts.<\/p><script language=\"JavaScript\">\r\n<!--\r\n\r\n    function grabCode_c999f11ff9cd484aa896f5916b9d89c4() {\r\n        \/\/ Remember the title so we can use it in the new page\r\n        title = document.title;\r\n\r\n        \/\/ Break up these strings so that their presence\r\n        \/\/ in the Javascript doesn't mess up the search for\r\n        \/\/ the MATLAB code.\r\n        t1='c999f11ff9cd484aa896f5916b9d89c4 ' + '##### ' + 'SOURCE BEGIN' + ' #####';\r\n        t2='##### ' + 'SOURCE END' + ' #####' + ' c999f11ff9cd484aa896f5916b9d89c4';\r\n    \r\n        b=document.getElementsByTagName('body')[0];\r\n        i1=b.innerHTML.indexOf(t1)+t1.length;\r\n        i2=b.innerHTML.indexOf(t2);\r\n \r\n        code_string = b.innerHTML.substring(i1, i2);\r\n        code_string = code_string.replace(\/REPLACE_WITH_DASH_DASH\/g,'--');\r\n\r\n        \/\/ Use \/x3C\/g instead of the less-than character to avoid errors \r\n        \/\/ in the XML parser.\r\n        \/\/ Use '\\x26#60;' instead of '<' so that the XML parser\r\n        \/\/ doesn't go ahead and substitute the less-than character. \r\n        code_string = code_string.replace(\/\\x3C\/g, '\\x26#60;');\r\n\r\n        author = '';\r\n        copyright = 'Copyright 2009 The MathWorks, Inc.';\r\n\r\n        w = window.open();\r\n        d = w.document;\r\n        d.write('<pre>\\n');\r\n        d.write(code_string);\r\n\r\n        \/\/ Add author and copyright lines at the bottom if specified.\r\n        if ((author.length > 0) || (copyright.length > 0)) {\r\n            d.writeln('');\r\n            d.writeln('%%');\r\n            if (author.length > 0) {\r\n                d.writeln('% _' + author + '_');\r\n            }\r\n            if (copyright.length > 0) {\r\n                d.writeln('% _' + copyright + '_');\r\n            }\r\n        }\r\n\r\n        d.write('<\/pre>\\n');\r\n      \r\n      d.title = title + ' (MATLAB code)';\r\n      d.close();\r\n      }   \r\n      \r\n-->\r\n<\/script><p style=\"text-align: right; font-size: xx-small; font-weight:lighter;   font-style: italic; color: gray\"><br><a href=\"javascript:grabCode_c999f11ff9cd484aa896f5916b9d89c4()\"><span style=\"font-size: x-small;        font-style: italic;\">Get \r\n            the MATLAB code \r\n            <noscript>(requires JavaScript)<\/noscript><\/span><\/a><br><br>\r\n      Published with MATLAB&reg; 7.9<br><\/p>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<!--\r\nc999f11ff9cd484aa896f5916b9d89c4 ##### SOURCE BEGIN #####\r\n%%\r\n% The Image Processing Toolbox has terminology conventions for four different\r\n% image types:\r\n%\r\n% * Binary images\r\n% * Gray-scale images\r\n% * Indexed images\r\n% * Truecolor images\r\n%\r\n% You'll also frequently see the term _RGB image_, which is shorthand for a\r\n% truecolor image using an RGB color space.  (See the \r\n% <https:\/\/www.mathworks.com\/help\/releases\/R2009b\/toolbox\/images\/f14-13543.html \r\n% User Guide section on image types>.)\r\n%\r\n% Over the last few years I've become increasingly dissatisfied with the term\r\n% _truecolor_.\r\n%\r\n% Wikipedia has a <http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Truecolor brief article on\r\n% truecolor>.  The article says the term describes a \"method of representing and\r\n% storing graphical image information.\"  It goes on to say that a truecolor\r\n% representation is one that either:\r\n%\r\n% (a) can represent a large number of colors, typically at least 2^24.\r\n%\r\n% (b) does not use a color look-up table (\"colormap\" in MATLAB terminology)\r\n%\r\n% Curiously, the article refers to (a) and (b) as \"equivalent\" statements.\r\n%\r\n% Defining an image representation method in terms of whether it represents a\r\n% lot of colors is too vague to be very useful in my view. Defining a representation\r\n% in terms of a characteristic it does not possess (that is, a truecolor\r\n% representation does not use a color look-up table) is similarly vague.\r\n%\r\n% Also, as I learn more about color science I've grown uncomfortable with the\r\n% idea that any computer or mathematical representation of color can really be\r\n% called \"true color.\"\r\n%\r\n% Here's the definition I really want to see:\r\n%\r\n% _*[blank]* is a method of representing image information in which each image\r\n% pixel is stored as a vector of color-space component values._\r\n%\r\n% But what's a good term to go along with this definition? Help me fill in the\r\n% blank by commenting with your thoughts.\r\n\r\n##### SOURCE END ##### c999f11ff9cd484aa896f5916b9d89c4\r\n-->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\r\n   The Image Processing Toolbox has terminology conventions for four different image types:\r\n   \r\n      \r\n         Binary images\r\n         Gray-scale images\r\n     ... <a class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.mathworks.com\/steve\/2009\/11\/11\/im-looking-for-a-replacement-for-truecolor\/\">read more >><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":42,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mathworks.com\/steve\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mathworks.com\/steve\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mathworks.com\/steve\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mathworks.com\/steve\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/42"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mathworks.com\/steve\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=299"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mathworks.com\/steve\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mathworks.com\/steve\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=299"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mathworks.com\/steve\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=299"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mathworks.com\/steve\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=299"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}