SELECTIVE DISPLAY OF INTERPOLATED OR EXTRAPOLAED VIDEO UNITS

• US 20090147854A1
• Filed: 04/29/2008
• Published: 06/11/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 12/10/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Qualcomm, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Qualcomm, Inc.
• Inventors: Dane, Gokce, El-Maleh, Khaled Helmi, Teng, Chia-Yuan, Dai, Min
• Granted Patent: US 8,660,175 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 375/240.160
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/105 Selection of the reference unit for prediction within a chosen coding or prediction mode, e.g. adaptive choice of position and number of pixels used for prediction
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/132 Sampling, masking or truncation of coding units, e.g. adaptive resampling, frame skipping, frame interpolation or high-frequency transform coefficient masking
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/139 Analysis of motion vectors, e.g. their magnitude, direction, variance or reliability
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/154 Measured or subjectively estimated visual quality after decoding, e.g. measurement of distortion use of rate-distortion criteria H04N19/147
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/156 Availability of hardware or computational resources, e.g. encoding based on power-saving criteria
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/172 the region being a picture, frame or field
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/51 Motion estimation or motion compensation
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/521 for estimating the reliability of the determined motion vectors or motion vector field, e.g. for smoothing the motion vector field or for correcting motion vectors
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/573 Motion compensation with multiple frame prediction using two or more reference frames in a given prediction direction
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/577 Motion compensation with bidirectional frame interpolation, i.e. using B-pictures
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/587 involving temporal sub-sampling or interpolation, e.g. decimation or subsequent interpolation of pictures in a video sequence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/61 in combination with predictive coding
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/145 Movement estimation for video coding H04N19/51
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/0132 the field or frame frequency of the incoming video signal being multiplied by a positive integer, e.g. for flicker reduction

Abstract

Display of an interpolated or extrapolated video unit, such as a video frame, may be selectively enabled based on a quality analysis. This disclosure also describes selection of reference video frames to be used for interpolation or extrapolation. A decoder may apply a quality-focused mode to select a reference frame based on quality criteria. The quality criteria may indicate a level of quality likely to be produced by a reference frame. If no reference frames satisfy the quality criteria, interpolation or extrapolation may be disabled. A decoder may apply a resource-focused frame interpolation mode to enable or disable frame interpolation or extrapolation for some frames based on power and quality considerations. In one mode, frame interpolation may be disabled to conserve power when reference frames are not likely to produce satisfactory quality. In another mode, the threshold may be adjustable as a function of power saving requirements of the decoder.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

analyzing one or more characteristics associated with an interpolated or extrapolated video unit produced by a frame rate upconversion process; and

selectively disabling presentation of the interpolated or extrapolated video unit on a display based on the analysis.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the interpolated or extrapolated video unit is an interpolated or extrapolated video frame.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more characteristics include one or more quality characteristics of the interpolated or extrapolated video unit.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the one or more quality characteristics include one or more objective visual quality metrics.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the one or more objective visual quality metrics include at least one of a blockiness metric, a blurriness metric, and a color bleeding metric.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more characteristics include one or more quality characteristics of one or more reference video units used to generate the interpolated or extrapolated video unit.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the quality characteristics include at least one of a pixel domain characteristic, a transform domain characteristic, and motion vector reliability.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more characteristics include one or more quality characteristics, the method further comprising disabling presentation of the interpolated or extrapolated video unit when the one or more quality characteristics do not satisfy a quality threshold.

9. A video decoding device comprising:

an analysis unit that analyzes one or more characteristics associated with an interpolated or extrapolated video unit produced by a frame rate upconversion process; and

a control unit that selectively disables presentation of the interpolated or extrapolated video unit on a display based on the analysis.

10. The device of claim 9, wherein the interpolated or extrapolated video unit is an interpolated or extrapolated video frame.

11. The device of claim 9, wherein the one or more characteristics include one or more quality characteristics of the interpolated or extrapolated video unit.

12. The device of claim 11, wherein the one or more quality characteristics include one or more objective visual quality metrics.

13. The device of claim 12, wherein the one or more objective visual quality metrics include at least one of a blockiness metric, a blurriness metric, and a color bleeding metric.

14. The device of claim 9, wherein the one or more characteristics include one or more quality characteristics of one or more reference video units used to generate the interpolated or extrapolated video unit.

15. The device of claim 14, wherein the quality characteristics include at least one of a pixel domain characteristic, a transform domain characteristic, and motion vector reliability.

16. The device of claim 9, wherein the one or more characteristics include one or more quality characteristics, and the control unit disables presentation of the interpolated or extrapolated video unit when the one or more quality characteristics do not satisfy a quality threshold.

17. The device of claim 9, wherein the device comprises a wireless communication device handset.

18. The device of claim 9, wherein the device comprises an integrated circuit device.

19. A video decoding device comprising:

means for analyzing one or more characteristics associated with an interpolated or extrapolated video unit produced by a frame rate upconversion process; and

means for selectively disabling presentation of the interpolated or extrapolated video unit on a display based on the analysis.

20. The device of claim 19, wherein the interpolated or extrapolated video unit is an interpolated or extrapolated video frame.

21. The device of claim 19, wherein the one or more characteristics include one or more quality characteristics of the interpolated or extrapolated video unit.

22. The device of claim 21, wherein the one or more quality characteristics include one or more objective visual quality metrics.

23. The device of claim 22, wherein the one or more objective visual quality metrics include at least one of a blockiness metric, a blurriness metric, and a color bleeding metric.

24. The device of claim 19, wherein the one or more characteristics include one or more quality characteristics of one or more reference units used to generate the interpolated or extrapolated video unit.

25. The device of claim 24, wherein the quality characteristics include at least one of a pixel domain characteristic, a transform domain characteristic, and motion vector reliability.

26. The device of claim 19, wherein the one or more characteristics include one or more quality characteristics, the device further comprising means for disabling presentation of the interpolated or extrapolated video unit when the one or more quality characteristics do not satisfy a quality threshold.

27. A computer-readable medium comprising instructions to cause one or more processors to:

analyze one or more characteristics associated with an interpolated or extrapolated video unit produced by a frame rate upconversion process; and

selectively disable presentation of the interpolated or extrapolated video unit on a display based on the analysis.

28. The computer-readable medium of claim 27, wherein the interpolated or extrapolated video unit is an interpolated or extrapolated video frame.

29. The computer-readable medium of claim 27, wherein the one or more characteristics include one or more quality characteristics of the interpolated or extrapolated video unit.

30. The computer-readable medium of claim 29, wherein the one or more quality characteristics include one or more objective visual quality metrics.

31. The computer-readable medium of claim 30, wherein the one or more objective visual quality metrics include at least one of a blockiness metric, a blurriness metric, and a color bleeding metric.

32. The computer-readable medium of claim 31, wherein the one or more characteristics include one or more quality characteristics of one or more reference video units used to generate the interpolated or extrapolated video unit.

33. The computer-readable medium of claim 32, wherein the quality characteristics include at least one of a pixel domain characteristic, a transform domain characteristic, and motion vector reliability.

34. The computer-readable medium of claim 27, wherein the one or more characteristics include one or more quality characteristics, the instructions further causing the one or more processors to disable presentation of the interpolated or extrapolated video unit when the one or more quality characteristics do not satisfy a quality threshold.