diff --git a/fsl/data/dicom.py b/fsl/data/dicom.py
index 8fe27c4f93860b48f954ef2dfbdd3e6a45412c48..8fb388e6e902d69a9ee7e9be2c3fc43698b22241 100644
--- a/fsl/data/dicom.py
+++ b/fsl/data/dicom.py
@@ -4,5 +4,149 @@
 #
 # Author: Paul McCarthy <pauldmccarthy@gmail.com>
 #
+"""This module provides the :class:`.DicomImage` class, which represents a
+volumetric DICOM data series. The ``DicomImage`` is simply an :class:`.`Image`
+which provides accessors for additional DICOM meta data.
 
-# TODO make dcmstack do all the work
+The following other functions are provided in this module, which are thin
+wrappers around functionality provided by ``pydicom`` and ``dcmstack``:
+
+.. autosummary::
+   :nosignatures:
+
+   scanDir
+   stack
+"""
+
+
+import os
+import fnmatch
+
+import pydicom as dicom
+
+from . import dcmstack
+
+from . import image as fslimage
+
+
+class DicomImage(fslimage.Image):
+    """The ``DicomImage`` is a volumetric :class:`.Image` with associated
+    DICOM metadata.
+
+    The ``Image`` class is used to manage the data and the voxel-to-world
+    transformation. Additional DICOM metadata may be accessed via TODO
+    """
+
+    def __init__(self, image, meta):
+        """Create a ``DicomImage``.
+        """
+        fslimage.Image.__init__(self, image)
+
+
+def scanDir(dcmdir, filePattern='*.dcm', callback=None):
+    """Recursively scans the given DICOM directory, and returns a dictionary
+    which contains all of the data series that were found.
+
+   :arg dcmdir:       Directory containing DICOM files.
+
+   :arg filePattern:  Glob-like pattern with which to identify DICOM files.
+                      Defaults to ``'*.dcm'``.
+
+   :arg callback:     Function which will get called every time a file is
+                      loaded, and can be used for e.g. updating progress.
+                      Must accept three positional parameters:
+                        - ``path``: Path
+                        - ``n``:    Index of current path
+                        - ``ttl``:  Total number of paths
+
+                      After all files have been loaded, this function is called
+                      once more before the files are grouped into data series.
+                      For this final call, ``path is None``, and ``n == ttl``.
+
+    :returns:         A list containing one element for each identified data
+                      series. Each element itself is a list with one element
+                      for each file, where each element is a tuple containing
+                      the ``pydicom.dataset.FileDataset``, and a ``dict``
+                      containing some basic metadata extracted from the file.
+
+    .. see:: ``dcmstack.parse_and_group`` and ``pydicom.dicomio.dcmread``.
+    """
+
+    def default_callback(path, n, ttl):
+        pass
+
+    if callback is None:
+        callback = default_callback
+
+    # Find all the DICOM files in the directory.
+    # If/when we drop python < 3.5, we can use:
+    #
+    #   glob.glob(op.join(dcmdir, '**', filePattern), recursive=True)
+    dcmfiles = []
+    for root, dirnames, filenames in os.walk(dcmdir):
+        for filename in fnmatch.filter(filenames, filePattern):
+            dcmfiles.append(os.path.join(root, filename))
+
+    # No files found
+    if len(dcmfiles) == 0:
+        return {}
+
+    # Tell pydicom to only load the tags that
+    # are necessary to group files into series,
+    # and to give us basic metadata.
+    tags = [
+        'SeriesInstanceUID',
+        'SeriesNumber',
+        'SeriesDescription',
+        'ProtocolName',
+        'ImageOrientationPatient',
+        'Rows',
+        'Columns',
+        'PixelSpacing']
+
+    # Load the files one by one
+    dcms = []
+    for i, path in enumerate(dcmfiles):
+        callback(path, i, len(dcmfiles))
+        dcms.append(dicom.dcmread(path, defer_size=64, specific_tags=tags))
+
+    callback(None, len(dcmfiles), len(dcmfiles))
+
+    # Group the files into data series
+    series = dcmstack.parse_and_group(dcms)
+
+    # parse_and_group returns a dict, with
+    # one entry for each data series, where
+    # each entry is a list containing
+    #   (pydicom file, metadata, filepath)
+    #
+    # We don't care about the dict keys,
+    series = list(series.values())
+
+    return series
+
+
+def stack(series, callback=None):
+    """Takes a DICOM data series, as returned by :func:`scanDir`, and converts
+    it to a ``dcmstack.DicomStack``.
+
+    :arg series:
+
+    :arg callback:
+
+    :returns:
+    """
+
+    def default_callback(path, n, ttl):
+        pass
+
+    if callback is None:
+        callback = default_callback
+
+    ds = dcmstack.DicomStack()
+
+    for i, (_, meta, filename) in enumerate(series):
+        callback(filename, i, len(series))
+        ds.add_dcm(dicom.dcmread(filename), meta)
+
+    return ds