Signal processing and tiered signal encoding
First Claim
1. A method of encoding at different levels of quality in a hierarchy, the method comprising:
- having a signal as input;
utilizing at least one downsample operation to produce downsampled renditions of the signal at successively lower levels of quality in the hierarchy;
applying at least one upsample operation to a downsampled rendition of the signal at a first level of quality to produce an upsampled rendition of the signal at a second level of quality in the hierarchy, the second level of quality being higher than the first level of quality; and
producing residual data indicating a difference between the downsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality and the upsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality, the method further comprising;
parsing the downsampled rendition of the signal at the first level of quality into multiple regions of elements; and
simultaneously processing the multiple regions in parallel to identify adjustments to elements in the multiple regions to locally reduce an entropy associated with the residual data.
1 Assignment
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Accused Products
Abstract
An encoder receives a signal. The encoder utilizes one or more downsample operations to produce downsampled renditions of the signal at successively lower levels of quality in the hierarchy. In a reverse direction, the encoder applies the one or more upsample operations to a downsampled rendition of the signal at a first level of quality to produce an upsampled rendition of the signal at a second level of quality in the hierarchy. The second level of quality is higher than the first level of quality. The one or more upsample operations and one or more downsample operations can be asymmetrical with respect to each other. That is, the function applied during downsampling can differ from the function applied when upsampling. The encoder produces residual data indicating a difference between the downsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality and the upsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality.
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Citations
32 Claims
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1. A method of encoding at different levels of quality in a hierarchy, the method comprising:
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having a signal as input; utilizing at least one downsample operation to produce downsampled renditions of the signal at successively lower levels of quality in the hierarchy; applying at least one upsample operation to a downsampled rendition of the signal at a first level of quality to produce an upsampled rendition of the signal at a second level of quality in the hierarchy, the second level of quality being higher than the first level of quality; and producing residual data indicating a difference between the downsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality and the upsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality, the method further comprising; parsing the downsampled rendition of the signal at the first level of quality into multiple regions of elements; and simultaneously processing the multiple regions in parallel to identify adjustments to elements in the multiple regions to locally reduce an entropy associated with the residual data. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14)
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15. A method of encoding at different levels of quality in a hierarchy, the method comprising:
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having a signal as input; utilizing at least one downsample operation to produce downsampled renditions of the signal at successively lower levels of quality in the hierarchy; applying at least one upsample operation to a downsampled rendition of the signal at a first level of quality to produce an upsampled rendition of the signal at a second level of quality in the hierarchy, the second level of quality being higher than the first level of quality; producing residual data indicating a difference between the downsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality and the upsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality; and adjusting settings of elements in the downsampled rendition of the signal at the first level of quality to reduce an entropy of the residual data needed to reconstruct a rendition of the signal at the second level of quality.
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16. A method of encoding at different levels of quality in a hierarchy, the method comprising:
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having a signal as input; utilizing at least one downsample operation to produce downsampled renditions of the signal at successively lower levels of quality in the hierarchy; applying at least one upsample operation to a downsampled rendition of the signal at a first level of quality to produce an upsampled rendition of the signal at a second level of quality in the hierarchy, the second level of quality being higher than the first level of quality; producing residual data indicating a difference between the downsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality and the upsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality; for each of multiple upsample options used to upsample the rendition of the signal at the first level of quality into the rendition of the signal at the second level of quality, adjusting settings of elements in the downsampled rendition of the signal at the first level of quality to reduce an entropy of the residual data needed to reconstruct a rendition of the signal at the second level of quality; and identifying which of the multiple upsample options and adjustments to the downsampled rendition of the signal at the first level of quality results in the substantially lowest entropy for the residual data.
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17. A method of encoding at different levels of quality in a hierarchy, the method comprising:
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having a signal as input; utilizing at least one downsample operation to produce downsampled renditions of the signal at successively lower levels of quality in the hierarchy; applying at least one upsample operation to a downsampled rendition of the signal at a first level of quality to produce an upsampled rendition of the signal at a second level of quality in the hierarchy, the second level of quality being higher than the first level of quality; producing residual data indicating a difference between the downsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality and the upsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality; implementing a continuous transform function to simulate a substantially rectangular function, the continuous transform function facilitating quantification of entropy associated with the residual data; wherein the continuous transform function is a sigmoid function; and wherein implementing the continuous transform function to simulate the substantially rectangular function further comprises;
generating an entropy function, a magnitude of the entropy function varying depending on different possible adjustments to the downsampled signal at the first level of quality; and
utilizing the entropy function to identify an adjustment to the downsampled signal at the first level of quality in which a respective entropy of the residual data for the adjustment is substantially minimal amongst the different possible adjustments.
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18. A method of encoding at different levels of quality in a hierarchy, the method comprising:
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having a signal as input; utilizing at least one downsample operation to produce downsampled renditions of the signal at successively lower levels of quality in the hierarchy; applying at least one upsample operation to a downsampled rendition of the signal at a first level of quality to produce an upsampled rendition of the signal at a second level of quality in the hierarchy, the second level of quality being higher than the first level of quality; producing residual data indicating a difference between the downsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality and the upsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality; repeatedly adjusting settings of elements in the downsampled rendition of the signal at the first level of quality to produce a tweaked rendition of the signal at the first level of quality; upsampling the tweaked rendition of the signal at the first level of quality to produce the upsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality; applying the residual data to the upsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality to produce an intermediate rendition of the signal at the second level of quality; tweaking elements in the intermediate rendition of the signal at the second level of quality to produce a tweaked rendition of the signal at the second level of quality; and generating a second set of residual data based on a difference between the upsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality and the tweaked rendition of the signal at the second level of quality.
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19. A method of encoding at different levels of quality in a hierarchy, the method comprising:
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having a signal as input; utilizing at least one downsample operation to produce downsampled renditions of the signal at successively lower levels of quality in the hierarchy; applying at least one upsample operation to a downsampled rendition of the signal at a first level of quality to produce an upsampled rendition of the signal at a second level of quality in the hierarchy, the second level of quality being higher than the first level of quality; producing residual data indicating a difference between the downsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality and the upsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality; and wherein utilizing the at least one downsample operation to produce the downsampled renditions of the signal at successively lower levels of quality further comprises; selecting a level of quality J in which to downsample the signal, the level of quality J representing a highest level of quality in the hierarchy; applying a selected downsampling operation to the signal at the level of quality J into a rendition of the signal at a level of quality J-1, the level of quality J-1 being a next lower level of quality beneath the level of quality J; tweaking settings of values in the rendition of the signal at level of quality J-1 to identify a tweaked rendition of the signal at the level of quality J-1 that reduces an entropy of residual data needed to reconstruct the signal at level of quality J. - View Dependent Claims (20, 21)
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22. Computer-readable storage hardware having instructions stored thereon, the instructions, when carried out by a processing device, causing the processing device to perform operations of:
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receiving a signal; utilizing at least one downsample operation to produce downsampled renditions of the signal at successively lower levels of quality in the hierarchy; applying at least one upsample operation to a downsampled rendition of the signal at a first level of quality to produce an upsampled rendition of the signal at a second level of quality in the hierarchy, the second level of quality being higher than the first level of quality; and producing residual data indicating a difference between the downsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality and the upsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality; parsing the downsampled rendition of the signal at the first level of quality into multiple regions of elements; and simultaneously processing the multiple regions in parallel to identify adjustments to elements in the multiple regions to locally reduce an entropy associated with the residual data.
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23. A computer system comprising:
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a processor; a memory unit that stores instructions associated with an application executed by the processor; and an interconnect coupling the processor and the memory unit, causing the computer system to execute the application and perform operations of; having a signal as input; utilizing at least one downsample operation to produce downsampled renditions of the signal at successively lower levels of quality in the hierarchy; applying at least one upsample operation to a downsampled rendition of the signal at a first level of quality to produce an upsampled rendition of the signal at a second level of quality in the hierarchy, the second level of quality being higher than the first level of quality; and producing residual data indicating a difference between the downsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality and the upsampled rendition of the signal at the second level of quality; wherein applying the at least one upsample operation further comprises;
applying multiple upsample operations to the downsampled rendition of the signal at the first level of quality; andwherein producing the residual data includes identifying which of multiple upsample options applied to the downsampled rendition of the signal at the first level of quality produces residual data having the substantially lowest entropy. - View Dependent Claims (24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32)
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Specification