brain images: Change data type of brain image

1 min read

Last update: 2012/09/04

An image file can be saved in different formats such as uint8 or int16, etc, based on different number of bytes used for each voxel. How to convert between them? Here is one solution using SPM functions (no need SPM’s interface). Assume img1.img is the original image with datatype int16, img2.img is the file you want to create with datatype uint8.

V=spm_vol('img1.img');
disp(V.dim); %you will find the last element is 4 in SPM2
V2=V;
V2.fname='img2.img';
V2.dim(4)=2;
M=spm_read_vols(V);
spm_write_vol(V2, M);

Explanation:
Variable V.dim is a 1×4 vector. The first three are number of voxels (or dimensions) along x,y and z direction. The last element (4th) is the number of bytes used for each voxel and it is this variable we want to change.

Note: If you are using SPM5 or SPM8, then the data type information is in V.dt

V=spm_vol('img1.img');
disp(V.dt); %for SPM5 and SPM8
V2=V;
V2.fname='img2.img';
V2.dt=[2 0];
M=spm_read_vols(V);
spm_write_vol(V2, M);

I myself find the following 3 SPM functions are extremely useful and use them a lot:

V=spm_vol('img1.img'); % read header information of an image file
M=spm_read_vols(V); % read the data (voxel intensity) from an image. The result is a 3D matrix with each point corresponding to a point in brain.
spm_write_vol(V2, M); % write data to an image file.

Check out here to see how to convert images with different formats (e.g. ANALYZE, Nifti, DICOM etc)



文献鸟 618 大优惠


写作助手,把中式英语变成专业英文


AI writing papers with real references


Want to receive new post notification? 有新文章通知我

第七十二期fNIRS Journal Club通知2026/6/6, 10am 曹家铭博士

随着近年来深度学习在DOT/fNIRS重建中的应用,研究者往往需要大规模地生成仿真数据,高性能的仿真和处理软件则显得尤为重要。来自澳门大学的曹家铭教授将介绍一款针对DOT的高性能光子仿真Python包
Wanling Zhu
10 sec read

第七十一期fNIRS Journal Club视频 段海军团队

Youtube: https://youtu.be/lMuG2bY4pvs 优酷:https://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XNjUyODE0NzI3Ng==.html 尽管已有成瘾
Wanling Zhu
18 sec read

第七十一期fNIRS Journal Club通知2026/5/9, 10am 段海军团队

尽管已有成瘾研究对毒品渴求的神经生物学机制进行了深入探索,但反复毒品吸食与戒断发作对人类社会行为的影响迄今仍尚未明晰。陕西师范大学段海军课题组的王一凡将介绍他们结合fNIRS超扫描技术与人际互动范式,
Wanling Zhu
13 sec read

2 Replies to “brain images: Change data type of brain image”

  1. If I’m not mistaken that’s only true for SPM2. For SPM5 and SPM8 the field ‘dim’ has only three entries and the first entry of the field ‘dt’ carries the information about the data type.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *