Video Compression

H.261
Standards Presentation
Qaiser-Ahmed Patel ECE 8873 Data Compression and Modeling Spring 2004

Contents

H.261 Overview Motivation Features of H.261 H.261 Coder Summary References

H.261 Overview

An ITU-T H-series standard applicable to videophone or video conferencing

ITU-T (International Telecom Union) Recommendation in 1990 Precursor to coding schemes found in H.263 and MPEG-1

Video coding algorithm is designed for transport using the Real-time Transport Protocol (RTP) Operates in real-time with limited delay Transmission bit rate is at multiples of 64Kbit/s

H.261 (p x 64) Motivation

Uncompressed video and audio data are huge Compression ratio of lossless methods is not high enough Target networks are p * 64Kbps, 1p30

64Kbps (p=1) < data rate < 1920Kbps (p=30) Covers transmission from ISDN base rate (64 Kbps) up past the T-1 data rate (1.54 Mbps) Maximum delay of 150 ms Inter-picture prediction - removes temporal redundancy Transform coding - removes the spatial redundancy Motion compensation uses motion vectors to help the codec compensate for motion

Coding algorithm is a hybrid of:

Data rate can be set between 40 Kbit/s and 2 Mbit/s Input signal format

CIF (Common Intermediate Format) and QCIF (Quarter CIF) available

Features of H.261 Source format

Bit rate

Picture formats

The target bit rate is ~ 64Kbps to 1920Kbps CIF (Common Intermediate Format) NTSC & PAL QCIF (Quarter Common Intermediate Format)

At 29.97 frames per second with 4:2:0 chrominance subsampling (Y:CB:CR)

Features of H.261 Video multiplex arrangement

Group of blocks structure

Picture coded as luminance and two color difference components (Y, CB and CR) Group of blocks (GOB) MacroBlock (MB) Block

H.261 - Video multiplex arrangement

4 layers in the compressed stream

Picture, GOB (Group Of Block), MB (MacroBlock), Block

11 3 GOB QCIF CIF MB

Cb Y

Cr

H.261 Picture Syntax (1/4)

H.261 Picture Syntax (2/4)

H.261 Picture Syntax (3/4)

H.261 Picture Syntax (4/4)

H.261 Coding Frame Types

Intra-Encoded Frames (I-Frames)

Similar to JPEG compression Spatial filtering still objects (transform coding)

9

Ex.: Black and White background pattern

Predicted Frames (P-Frame)

Predicted based on earlier frame Temporal filtering Inter-picture prediction

9

Ex.: Application User

H.261 - Motion Compensation

Assumption

As parts of an image moves, its colors stays mostly constant

Idea

Find similar parts in other images Encode where it was found (i.e. motion vector) Previous decoded image Reference image Image to code Target Image Encode the residual only

H.261 Coder

Outline block diagram for H.261 codec

External control

Coding control Video multiplex coder Transmission buffer Coded bitstream

Source coder Video Signal Source decoder

a) Video coder
Video multiplex decoder Receiving buffer

b) Video decoder

H.261 coder structure (1/2)

Encoder
Intra/inter

Coding control

Mode Qp

DCT

Q Q-1

VLC

Video out

Video in DCT-1 + MC Frame buffer MV ME

H.261 coder structure (2/2)

Decoder
Step size Error Correction Buffer Intra/inter Input data Motion Vector + Frame Memory Decoded data VLC Decoder Q-1

IDCT

MC

Discrete Cosine Transformation (DCT)

Overview:

64 2-D DCT basis functions:

FFT vs. DCT: Like FFT, but approximates lines with fewer coefficients

Discrete Cosine Transformation (DCT) Computation

Factoring reduces transformation to a series of 1-Dimensional DCTs

Demo

Miss America (QCIF)

Summary

H.261

Techniques used:

Used in video/teleconferencing Two dimensional (2-D) 8 X 8 DCT to remove intra-frame correlation Zig-zag order to scan the transform coefficients Run Length coding for zero-valued coefficients after quantization Motion estimation is applied to video sequence to improve the prediction between successive frames Transmission rates control in the range of p X 64 Kbps Error resilience including synchronization and concealment technique required in transmission code, to cover up channel errors Common Intermediate Format (CIF) and Quarter CIF (QCIF) for a single solution to different video formats (NTSC / PAL)

References

Video codec for audiovisual services at p x 64 kbit/s ITUT (International Telecommunication Union Telecommunication Standardization Sector) Recommendation H.261, 1993 Stephen J. Solari, Digital Video and Audio Compression, McGraw-Hill Professional; (March 1, 1997) K. Rijkse, H.261 : Video Coding for Low-Bit-Rate Communication, IEEE Communications Magazine, pp. 42 45

H.261 Video Coding http://www-mobile.ecs.soton.ac.uk/peter/h261/h261.html