title: Is sending data as application/octet-stream any more efficient than sending it as a JSON-encoded byte array?
body: <p>I have a web application that allows a client to request several image thumbnails at once. The response is currently sent as a JSON-encoded list of objects where each object includes the (encoded) image data. (I'm using JSON.NET; it looks like it's encoding the image data as base64 strings).</p>
  
  <p>If I change my application such that the image data is sent separately from the JSON object, as "binary" (application/octet-stream) content, will this be more efficient?</p>
  
  <p>Or put more simply, is application/octet stream a more compact encoding than base64?</p>
  
  <p>Also, how does this differ from image/jpeg?</p>