imread_irfanview(fi​lename)

Read Images not supported by Matlab, but supported by Irfanview

Matlab sometimes does not support an certain image format. For instance Error reading bmp data Bitfield compression not supported.
This function imread_irfanview, uses the installed Irfanview application to convert the not-supported image file to a TIF file supported by Matlab.
Note, probably you have to change the PATH to the Irfanview application inside your code.
Example,
I = imread_irfanview('test.bmp');
figure, imshow(I);