Sanyo Electric Co., Ltd.

Satoko Kobayashi

Takashi Urano

Yasuhachi Hamamoto

Etsuko Sugimoto

Hideo Kodama

Koichi Tsuchikane

A method is disclosed, for encoding a signal with a three dimensional image sequence using a series of left and right images. Each image in the left image series is a picture formed by non-interlaced or interlaced scanned left line images, and each image in the right image series is a picture formed by non-interlaced or interlaced scanned right line images. The left line images contained in the left picture are merged with the right line images contained in the right picture to produce an alternately arranged left and right line merged picture. The merged picture is encoded using an MPEG-2 compliant encoder.

Three-dimensional image coding by merger of left and right images

A method and apparatus for adaptively selecting a coding mode for video encoding systems using the techniques of predictive coding, interpolative coding, motion compensation, discrete cosine transformation (DCT), adaptive quantization, or variable length coding. In one system, a value related to an amount of total code, which is composed of current video code and its coding parameters for each of the above coding modes, is determined, respectively, and a coding mode corresponding to the smallest value is selected. Then, the encoding is performed using the selected coding mode.

Method and apparatus for adaptively selecting a coding mode for video

A motion vector detecting circuit and a motion video compressing system are disclosed. The detecting circuit detect a vector which direct from a spatial location of a current macroblock to a spatial location of a reference macroblock. The detecting circuit includes a first extracting circuit, a second extracting circuit and a searching circuit. The first extracting circuit extracts upper bits from each pixel data of the current macroblock. The second extracting circuit extracts upper bits from each pixel data of the reference frame. The searching circuit searches the upper-bits-extracted reference frame for a macroblock having the strongest correlation with the current macroblock by comparing the upper-bits-extracted current macroblock with the upper-bits-extracted reference frame and outputs the spatial location of the reference macroblock. The motion video compressing system includes the motion vector detecting circuit, a transform-coding circuit, a subtracter, a comparator and a controller. The transform-coding circuit codes inputted data into compressed. The subtracter calculates a difference between each pixel data of the current macroblock and each corresponding pixel data of the reference macroblock directed by the motion vector. The comparator compares an amount of data being obtained by the transform-coding the current macroblock with an amount of data being obtained by the transform-coding the differential macroblock. The controller controls the transform-coding circuit such that the transform-coding circuit outputs which of the compressed current macroblock and the compressed differential macroblock has a smaller amount of data.

Motion video coding systems with motion vector detection

An input bitstream (a first bitstream) is divided into a main code having a changeable length and the remaining data. The main code is subjected to a bit-rate conversion and combined with the remainig data to output a second bitstream. By this arrangement, the configuration ofthe bit-rate conversion circuit can be simplified and delay in the conversion process can be reduced. Incidentally, the main code corresponds to the DCT-coefficient data(e) and the quantizer scale(d), while the remaining data corresponds to the header data(a), the handling type data(b) and the motion vector data(c) respectively. Furthermore, by using the fact that if the quantizer scale is enlarged and the compression rate is raised, the degradation of a reproduced picture with a large DCT-coefficient's value of higher frequency terms is not conspicuous but the degradation of a reproduced picture with a small DCT-coefficient's value of higher frequency terms is conspicuous, and by changing the compression rate based on the DCT-coefficient's value of higher frequency terms, a bitstream with a low bit-rate but a small degradation in the reproduced picture quality can be obtained.

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Yokosuka, Japan

Satoko Kobayashi