Implications for Image Watermarking of Recent Work in Image Analysis and Representation

We consider the potential implications of recent developments in subfields of image analysis and image representation for watermarking and steganography. We consider three rapidly developing subfields: 1. Natural Scene Statistics; 2. Level Set Image Processing and Geometric Diffusion; and 3. Computational Harmonic Analysis. Each of these subfields has recently claimed progress either in characterizing or processing images. We interpret all such progress as implicitly or explicitly identifying invariants of real images. Such invariants are potential tools for studying the effects of watermarking or steganography in an image. We briefly survey these three subfields, give several examples of such invariants, and explore the effects of model watermarking schemes on such invariants.