Reading images into LaboImage
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Standard images (I/O => load image => standard)

   The input images are required to be in the standard format defined by
   LaboImage, i.e. the image data in a binary file with the suffix '.ima'
   and the image descriptor containing information on the data in an ASCII
   file with the same name and suffix '.des' (see "format.description"
   file).

Pseudo-Standard images (I/O => load image => standard*)

   The image is in the standard format, but the descriptor is incomplete.
   The required fields are 'Type', 'Row-Count' and 'Column-Count'. The
   other fields (statistics values) will be computed and updated while
   reading the image. A descriptor file can be created by the option
   "AUXILIARY=>desctool".

Non-standard images :

I/O => load image => byte free format

   This option is for images not conforming to LaboImage format, but rather
   of the type 'byte'. The following parameters should be specified:
      1. header length in bytes;
      2. number of rows;
      3. number of bytes in each row;
      4. number of columns;
      5. number of bytes to be skipped before each value to be read.

I/O => load image => rgb free format
   
   This option is similar to the previous one, but three bytes are read
   for each pixel (R, G, B) instead of one.

I/O => load image => melanie

   This option is to read electrophoresis gel images, conforming to the
   "melanie" format defined at the Hospital of Geneva.

I/O => load image => sun raster

   This option is for reading 8 bit-depth Sun rasterfile.
