MINUTES

MINUTES:WORKING GROUP 11 (DISPLAY FUNCTION STANDARD), DICOM STANDARDS COMMITTEE

PLACE OF MEETING:NEMA HEADQUARTERS

ROSSLYN, VIRGINIA

DATES AND TIMESTUESDAY, APRIL 20, 1999

9:00 A.M.

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 21, 1999

8:00 A.M.

MEMBERS PRESENT

Kish Chakrabarti*CDRH, FDA

David ClunieQuintilles Intelligent Imaging

Craig CorneliusCEMAX-ICON, a Kodak Company

Thurman Gillespy IIIACR/Un. of Washington

Brad HemmingerUn. of North Carolina

Janet KeyesLorad

Kevin Kohm (Speaker phone)*Eastman Kodak Company

Cor LoefPhilips Medical Systems

Alan RowbergACR

Peter ScharlSiemens AG

MEMBERS ABSENT

Nicholas BrownThe Sheiling

Minglin LiISG Technologies

Lawrence TarboxSiemens Medical Systems

OTHERS PRESENT

Robert DolanAnalogic Corporation

Jay Gaeta (Speaker phone)*Merge Technologies

Herman Oosterwijk (Speaker phone)*OTech

David Snavely NEMA Staff

* Tuesday only

PRESIDING OFFICER: DR. THURMAN GILLESPY III, CHAIRMAN

1.APPROVAL OF PREVIOUS MINUTES

The minutes from the February 26, 1999 meeting were approved as presented.

2.ELECTION OF CO-CHAIRMAN

Brad Hemminger was elected Co-Chairman of WG 11.

3.REPORT ON EUROPEAN CONGRESS OF RADIOLOGY

Members expressed the opinion that the Demonstration of Grayscale Soft Copy Presentation State Storage at the ECR meeting went very well. At ECR the general feeling was that it should be repeated at RSNA. The software worked well for the purpose that it was designed for. There was a problem of measuring the ambient light in that people are doing it differently. Members suggested that information should be put in the Standard on how ambient light should be measured.

4.REVIEW OF PROPOSALS RECEIVED TO THE RFP

Members commented that the only change in this RFP for a demonstration at RSNA and the RFP for the demonstration at ECR is the adding of hardcopy print. This does present the problem of integrating the different printer vendors who might participate. The condition in the OTech proposal of limiting the number of printers to be tested and integrated to two is not acceptable to NEMA. NEMA requires the demonstration to be open to anyone. The possibility was suggested of having incremental cost with additional printers and that the print vendors would share the cost.

Eastman Kodak responded to the proposal as a printer vendor. They suggested that film size ID, illumination and reflected ambient light attributes were not necessary for the SCU to send for this demonstration. However, members felt these were important and should not be removed but that some printers may not support these.

Members performed a technical review of the OTech proposal and discussed it with Herman Oosterwijk of OTech. Members had no comment on Part 1. Under Hardware and Software Environment Requirements Herman Oosterwijk explained that Solaris using JAVA did not work well in that they had problems with it crashing. They will use a Dome board because using another manufacturer’s board may require rewriting the existing software. They will use another manufacturer’s monitor. OTech did not intend to tie into the RSNA DICOM network. Members of WG 11 felt it would be nice to do that and will contact RSNA about the connection and to get RSNA to list the equipment OTech needs.

Under Display Requirements members agreed with their list of what would be displayed as a minimum. With regard to removing support for overlays and bitmap shutters members felt overlays should be left in. Herman Oosterwijk stated that curves had not been tested but overlays and bitmap shutters had been tested and would be left in the proposal. Members agreed that requirement DY9 should be removed.

Under Print Requirements it was agreed that Agfa would get a printer for them in Germany by June. The burden of testing is the responsibility of the printer manufacturers. It was stated if there were more than five printers in the demonstration that space may be a problem. RSNA should be asked to provide sufficient space. The time limit for printer manufacturers to respond was suggested as June 1, 1999. Under DICOM Interface Requirements, DC4 Herman Oosterwijk agreed they would do writing.

Under Acceptance Requirements Herman Oosterwijk agreed that they would do the acceptance tests AC1 - AC5. Under Additional Assumptions and Conditions, OTech asked for the services of a Image Quality Specialist. Thurman Gillespy agreed to serve in that capacity.

Herman Oosterwijk estimated they would have the software to the printer vendors by August-September time frame. Added to the Milestones were the following:

June 1Commitment by vendors

June 15Printer on site

September 1Software to vendors

October 15Final testing and looking at image quality

November 1Delivery of vendor equipment to Chicago staging site

RSNA will be asked to provide high quality view boxes. It was moved and passed to accept the proposal from OTech with the changes discussed.

5.SUPPLEMENT 33 - GRAYSCALE SOFT COPY PRESENTATION STATE

STORAGE

David Clunie went over changes incorporated since the last meeting. Members then discussed comments by Nicholas Brown. Members accepted his suggested modification to the introduction to make the intent more clear. The need for color LUTs is not a grayscale issue. Members felt that requiring the width and height in pixels of the screen area that was used to display the image on the originating system goes too far for what is to be accomplished by this supplement. Members also felt that specifying the height and width in pixels of the screen area which was allocated by the originating system to the image and labels also goes beyond what is to be accomplished by this supplement.

Members did recommend that a new attribute called “Point” be added in Table C.11-1 Modality LUT Module Attributes and that text be added to describe it.

David Clunie proposed that the “Specific Character Set” attribute is not needed and should be turned into a note. Neil Hunt provided a written commented on specifying justification and the problem of rotation of the bounding boxes when they have multiple lines. To handle this, David Clunie proposed adding an attribute called “Text Justification within Bounding Box” which would provide for left and right justification and text centering. It would state that “The text shall be rendered from top left hand corner of the bounding box to right hand corner of the bounding box even if the bounding box has been rotated. An example will be provided on how text is handled when rotated.

Marco Eichelberg’s comments were handled by making clear that for TLHC and BRHC the order is column/row. In Section X.2.2 Mask, it was agreed to leave multiframe out. Also, notes were to be added to give examples for each case. A note is to be added to clarify aspect ratio. To Section C.10.5.1.2 Graphic Data and Graphic Type add that the lines must pass through the points. To Table C.12-6 Presentation State Module Attributes add “Preferred Presentation Size” and “Pixel Spacing” which would be a 1C with required if true size.

6.ANNOTATION MODULE ATTRIBUTES

Cor Loef reported that WG 6 had asked how annotation in the Waveform Supplement relates to the Presentation Annotation and are the constructs the same in both. WG 11 members felt that WG 11 should only look at the pixels and ignore the rest that is in the annotation module in Waveform. They felt there was a slight risk of inconsistency but that they see no issues at the present time.

7.DEVELOPMENT OF TEST PLAN

Members agreed to start with the test plan developed for the ECR Demonstration and add to it the requirements for printers. Members divided up assignments and agreed that the draft would be sent around to each member for inclusion of their part. The Test Plan must be completed so that it can be sent to Herman Oosterwijk by May 15, 1999.

8.ACTION ITEMS

a) Draft rejection letter of other proposal and provide to Vicki Schofield - Thurman Gillespy

b) Review and approval of revised proposal and provide to Vicki Schofield - Thurman Gillespy

c) Readvertise the Demonstration - Vicki Schofield

d) Solicitation of Funds - Committee for the Advancement of DICOM

e) Modified RFP on NEMA Server

f) Revised draft of Supplement 33 - David Clunie

g) Final Test Plan to Herman Oosterwijk by May 15 - All WG 11 members

h) Test for Windowing Level - Alan Rowberg

9.AGENDA FOR NEXT MEETING

  • Change proposal for Table D.1-2 Look-Up Table for Calibrating Display System in Part 14
  • Advanced Presentation State
  • Presentation on Image Processing and Graphics
  • Review of Progress on Demonstration
  • Supplement 33

a) Preparation of frozen draft for Demonstration

b) Preparation for letter ballot

10.TIME AND PLACE OF NEXT MEETING

The next meeting of WG 11 is planned for June 7 - 8, 1999 at NEMA Headquarters in Rosslyn, Virginia. The following meeting is planned for September 8 - 9, 1999 at NEMA Headquarters in Rosslyn, Virginia.

11. ADJOURNMENT

The meeting adjourned at 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday after a recess for lunch between 12:00 p.m. and 1:10 p.m. and at 3:30 p.m. on Wednesday after a recess for lunch between 12:15 p.m. and 1:40 p.m.

Reported by: David Snavely

Secretary,

WG 11, DICOM Stds. Comte.

(5/3/99)

REVIEWED BY COUNSEL