METHOD AND INTEGRATED CIRCUIT FOR VIDEO PROCESSING

• US 20090190037A1
• Filed: 01/25/2008
• Published: 07/30/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 01/25/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Xueshan Technologies Inc. (Wi-LAN Inc.)
• Original Assignee: MediaTek, Inc.
• Inventors: Chang, Te-Hao, Lin, Siou-Shen, Liang, Chin-Chuan
• Granted Patent: US 9,641,861 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 348/699
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/102 characterised by the element, parameter or selection affected or controlled by the adaptive coding
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/137 Motion inside a coding unit, e.g. average field, frame or block difference
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/176 the region being a block, e.g. a macroblock
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/527 Global motion vector estimation
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/533 Motion estimation using multistep search, e.g. 2D-log search or one-at-a-time search [OTS]
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/56 Motion estimation with initialisation of the vector search, e.g. estimating a good candidate to initiate a search
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/57 Motion estimation characterised by a search window with variable size or shape
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/61 in combination with predictive coding

Abstract

An integrated circuit capable of video processing and a method thereof is disclosed. The integrated circuit comprises an image information generator, an adaptive motion vector (MV) candidate generator, and a block matching unit. The image information generator receives reference and current video data to determine image information. The adaptive MV candidate generator, coupled to the image information generator, receives the reference and current video data to generate spatial and temporal MV candidates, and generates an updated MV candidate based on the image information. The block matching unit, coupled to the adaptive MV candidate generator, receives the spatial and temporal MV candidates and the updated MV candidate and performs block matching to determine an output MV therefrom.

Claims

1. An integrated circuit capable of video processing, comprising:

an image information generator, receiving reference and current video data to determine image information;

an adaptive motion vector (MV) candidate generator, coupled to the image information generator, receiving the reference and current video data to generate a set of MV candidates, generating at least an updated MV candidate based on the image information, and outputting the set of MV candidates regarding to the updated MV candidate; and

a block matching unit, coupled to the adaptive MV candidate generator, receiving the MV candidates and performing block matching to determine an output MV.

2. The integrated circuit of claim 1, wherein the image information is a measure of motion complexity of the video data, and the adaptive MV candidate generator adjusts the updated MV candidate with reference to the motion complexity.

3. The integrated circuit of claim 1, wherein the image information is a motion speed determined by motion vectors of the video data, and the adaptive MV candidate generator adjusts the updated MV candidate with reference to the motion speed.

4. The integrated circuit of claim 1, wherein the image information is a block difference determined by differences between pixels of blocks of the reference and current video data, and the adaptive MV candidate generator adjusts the updated MV candidate with reference to the block difference.

5. The integrated circuit of claim 1, wherein the image information is a global motion speed determined by an average of MVs at predetermined locations of the video data, and the adaptive MV candidate generator adjusts the updated MV candidate with reference to the global motion speed.

6. The integrated circuit of claim 1, wherein the image information is a measure of texture or image complexity, and the adaptive MV candidate generator adjusts the updated MV candidate with reference to the texture or image complexity.

7. The integrated circuit of claim 1, wherein the adaptive MV candidate generator generates the MV candidates using a 3-dimentional (3-D) recursive search algorithm.

8. The integrated circuit of claim 7, wherein the adaptive MV candidate generator further generates a random vector, and determines to add a predetermined difference to the random vector, or subtract the predetermined difference from the random vector according to the image information, to generate the updated MV candidate.

9. The integrated circuit of claim 7, wherein the adaptive MV candidate generator further generates a random vector, and determines to multiply a predetermined gain with the random vector, and divide the random vector by the predetermined gain according to the image information, to generate the updated MV candidate.

10. The integrated circuit of claim 1, wherein the adaptive MV candidate generator outputs the set of MV candidates along with the updated MV candidate.

11. The integrated circuit of claim 1, wherein at least one MV candidate in the set of MV candidates output from the adaptive MV candidate generator is replaced by the updated MV candidate.

12. An integrated circuit capable of video processing, comprising:

an image information generator, receiving reference and current video data to determine image information;

an adaptive motion vector (MV) candidate generator, coupled to the image information generator, determining a search range size based on the image information, and receiving the reference and current video data to generate MV candidates according to the search range size; and

a block matching unit, coupled to the adaptive MV candidate generator, receiving the MV candidates and perform block matching to determine an output MV therefrom.

13. The integrated circuit of claim 12, wherein the image information is a measure of motion complexity of the video data, and the adaptive MV candidate generator adjusts the search range size with reference to the motion complexity.

14. The integrated circuit of claim 13, wherein the image information is a motion speed determined by motion vectors of the video data, and the adaptive MV candidate generator adjusts the search range size with reference to the motion speed.

15. The integrated circuit of claim 12, wherein the image information is a block difference determined by differences between pixels of blocks of the reference and current video data, and the adaptive MV candidate generator adjusts the search range size with reference to the block difference.

16. The integrated circuit of claim 12, wherein the image information is a global motion speed determined by an average of MVs at predetermined locations of the video data, and the adaptive MV candidate generator adjusts the search range size with reference to the global motion speed.

17. The integrated circuit of claim 12, wherein the image information is a measure of texture or image complexity, and the adaptive MV candidate generator adjusts the search range size with reference to the texture or image complexity.

18. The integrated circuit of claim 12, wherein the adaptive MV candidate generator generates the MV candidates using full search or 3-step search algorithm.

19. A method for video processing, comprising:

determining and deriving image information from reference and current video data;

generating MV candidates from the reference and current video data by a fixed scenario;

generating an updated MV candidate based on the image information; and

performing block matching based on the MV candidates with regards to the updated MV candidate to determine an output MV.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein the image information is a measure of motion complexity of the video data, and generating the updated MV candidate further comprises adjusting the value of the updated MV candidate with reference to the motion complexity.

21. The method of claim 19, wherein the image information is a motion speed determined by motion vectors of the video data, and generating the updated MV candidate further comprises adjusting the value of the updated MV candidate with reference to the motion speed.

22. The method of claim 19, wherein the image information is a block difference determined by differences between pixels of blocks of the reference and current video data, and generating the updated MV candidate further comprises adjusting the value of the updated MV candidate with reference to the block difference.

23. The method of claim 19, wherein the image information is a global motion speed determined by an average of MVs at predetermined locations of the video data, and generating the updated MV candidate further comprises adjusting the updated MV candidate with reference to the global motion speed.

24. The method of claim 19, wherein the image information is a measure of texture or image complexity, and generating the updated MV candidate with reference to the texture or image complexity.

25. The method of claim 19, further comprising generating a random vector, and wherein generating the updated MV candidate further comprises determining to add a predetermined difference to the random vector, or subtract the predetermined difference from the random vector according to the image information, to generate the updated MV candidate.

26. The method of claim 19, further comprising generating a random vector, and wherein generating the updated MV candidate further comprises determining to multiply a predetermined gain with the random vector, and divide the random vector by the predetermined gain according to the image information, to generate the updated MV candidate.