diff --git a/api/valor_api/backend/core/geometry.py b/api/valor_api/backend/core/geometry.py
index b8966163f..505e74b94 100644
--- a/api/valor_api/backend/core/geometry.py
+++ b/api/valor_api/backend/core/geometry.py
@@ -1,8 +1,9 @@
 import io
+import struct
 from base64 import b64encode
 
-from geoalchemy2 import Geometry
-from geoalchemy2.functions import ST_AsPNG
+import numpy as np
+from geoalchemy2 import Geometry, RasterElement
 from geoalchemy2.types import CompositeType
 from PIL import Image
 from sqlalchemy import (
@@ -313,7 +314,7 @@ def convert_geometry(
 
 def _raster_to_png_b64(
     db: Session,
-    raster: Image.Image,
+    raster: RasterElement,
 ) -> str:
     """
     Convert a raster to a png.
@@ -330,16 +331,54 @@ def _raster_to_png_b64(
     str
         The encoded raster.
     """
-    raster = Image.open(io.BytesIO(db.scalar(ST_AsPNG((raster))).tobytes()))
-    if raster.mode != "L":
-        raise RuntimeError
+    # Ensure raster_wkb is a bytes-like object
+    raster_wkb = bytes.fromhex(raster.data)
+
+    # Unpack header to get width and height
+    # reference: https://postgis.net/docs/manual-dev/RT_reference.html
+    header_format = "<BHHddddddiHH"
+    header_size = struct.calcsize(header_format)
+    (
+        ndr,
+        version,
+        num_bands,
+        scale_x,
+        scale_y,
+        ip_x,
+        ip_y,
+        skew_x,
+        skew_y,
+        srid,
+        width,
+        height,
+    ) = struct.unpack(header_format, raster_wkb[:header_size])
+
+    # Check if the raster has a single band
+    if num_bands != 1:
+        raise ValueError("This function only supports single-band rasters.")
+
+    # Calculate the number of bytes needed for the pixel data
+    # Each byte represents 1 pixel
+    num_pixels = width * height
+    num_bytes = num_pixels
+
+    # Convert the byte data to a binary array
+    pixel_format = "B"
+    pixel_data = struct.unpack(
+        f"{width * height}{pixel_format}",
+        raster_wkb[header_size + 2 : header_size + 2 + num_bytes],
+    )
+
+    # Convert pixel data to numpy array
+    raster_numpy = np.array(pixel_data, dtype=bool)
+    raster_numpy = raster_numpy.reshape((height, width))
 
-    # mask is greyscale with values 0 and 1. to convert to binary
-    # we first need to map 1 to 255
-    raster = raster.point(lambda x: 255 if x == 1 else 0).convert("1")
+    # Convert to Pillow Image
+    raster_image = Image.fromarray(raster_numpy)
 
+    # b64 encode PNG to mask str
     f = io.BytesIO()
-    raster.save(f, format="PNG")
+    raster_image.save(f, format="PNG")
     f.seek(0)
     mask_bytes = f.read()
     return b64encode(mask_bytes).decode()
diff --git a/api/valor_api/schemas/geometry.py b/api/valor_api/schemas/geometry.py
index aeaa89fb5..409560f98 100644
--- a/api/valor_api/schemas/geometry.py
+++ b/api/valor_api/schemas/geometry.py
@@ -915,7 +915,7 @@ def from_numpy(cls, mask: np.ndarray) -> "Raster":
                 f"Expecting a binary mask (i.e. of dtype bool) but got dtype {mask.dtype}"
             )
         f = io.BytesIO()
-        PIL.Image.fromarray(mask).save(f, format="PNG")
+        PIL.Image.fromarray(mask).save(f, format="PNG", mode="1")
         f.seek(0)
         mask_bytes = f.read()
         f.close()
@@ -1038,7 +1038,7 @@ def to_psql(self) -> ScalarSelect | bytes:
                     0,  # skewy
                     0,  # srid
                 ),
-                "8BUI",
+                "1BB",
             )
             geom_raster = ST_AsRaster(
                 ST_SnapToGrid(
@@ -1047,7 +1047,7 @@ def to_psql(self) -> ScalarSelect | bytes:
                 ),
                 1.0,  # scalex
                 1.0,  # scaley
-                "8BUI",  # pixeltype
+                "1BB",  # pixeltype
                 1,  # value
                 0,  # nodataval
             )
@@ -1056,7 +1056,7 @@ def to_psql(self) -> ScalarSelect | bytes:
                     empty_raster,
                     geom_raster,
                     "[rast2]",
-                    "8BUI",
+                    "1BB",
                     "UNION",
                 )
             ).scalar_subquery()
diff --git a/integration_tests/benchmarks/object-detection/benchmark_script.py b/integration_tests/benchmarks/object-detection/benchmark_script.py
index 52a64682a..5dcc6a4ea 100644
--- a/integration_tests/benchmarks/object-detection/benchmark_script.py
+++ b/integration_tests/benchmarks/object-detection/benchmark_script.py
@@ -233,7 +233,7 @@ def run_detailed_pr_curve_evaluation(dset: Dataset, model: Model):
 
 
 def run_benchmarking_analysis(
-    limits_to_test: list[int] = [3, 3],
+    limits_to_test: list[int] = [6, 6],
     results_file: str = "results.json",
     data_file: str = "data.json",
 ):