In recent years, many different color encodings have been developed for use in a wide variety of digital imaging applications. Some of these color encodings have been proposed/standardized by various standards bodies or industry groups, while others are being used without any official standardization. In order to unambiguously communicate digital color images in open systems, it is important that the color encoding used to represent the image data be clearly and completely defined. In many cases, the lack of such clear specifications has led to confusion and inconsistency in the way some color encodings have been used. This can lead to significant interoperability problems when various components in an imaging system interpret the color encoding in an incompatible manner. Recently, ISO 22028-1 (a joint project between ISO TC42, ISO TC130 and CIE) has reached the Committee Draft stage. The goal of this standard is to define a framework and a consistent set of guidelines that can be used for defining digital color encodings. While this standard does not itself define any color encodings, it is anticipated that it will be used as the basis for specifying future color encoding standards.