multiscale

The processing or representation of data along multiple scales. For example, progressively subsampling an image until it is a single pixel (akin to a mipmap) would constitute multiple scales of consideration, but so could using different models for fine and coarse time-details of a signal. The wavelet transform is a classical example of multiscale processing, as are multigrid methods. Multiscale methods (rather than e.g. anisotropic methods which treat different directions independently) are inherently hierarchical.