In order to fully comprehend the DCT will do a basic study of the Fourier theory and the Fourier transform first.
Whilst the DCT is ultimately used in multimedia compression it is easier to perhaps comprehend how such compression methods work by studying Fourier theory, from which the DCT is actually derived.
preview:
http://www.cs.cf.ac.uk/Dave/Multimedia/node225.html
12/3/2002
