1. A computer system for performing imaging operations on a digital image, comprising: a processing unit; executable software code for requesting an imaging operation to be performed on a digital image; a codec manager operably coupled to the executable software code for receiving the request to perform an imaging operation on the digital image, discovering one or more imaging components for performing the imaging operation on the digital image, the imaging components including a plurality of operations that may be performed by the imaging components on the digital image, assigning a weight for each operation that may be performed by the imaging components on the digital image, and for selecting the imaging component from the plurality of imaging components that has a sum of weights assigned for each performable operation that is greater than the sum of weights assigned for each performable operation performable by another imaging component to perform the requested imaging operation on the digital image; and a selected imaging component operably coupled to the codec manager, the selected imaging component having registered information in the computer system that may indicate that the selected imaging component may perform imaging operations on the digital image.