• Journal of Korea Multimedia Society
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• v.8 no.8
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• pp.1080-1087
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• 2005

Significant computations for full search (FS) motion estimation have been a big obstacle in real-time video coding and recent MPEG-4 AVC (advanced video coding) standard requires much more computations than conventional MPEG-2 for motion estimation. To reduce an amount of computation of full search (FS) algorithm for fast motion estimation, we propose a new and fast matching algorithm without any degradation of predicted images like the conventional FS. The computational reduction without any degradation in predicted image comes from fast elimination of impossible candidate motion vectors. We obtain faster elimination of inappropriate motion vectors using efficient matching units from localization of complex area in image data and dithering order based matching scan. Our algorithm reduces about $30\%$ of computations for block matching error compared with the conventional partial distortion elimination (PDE) algorithm, and our algorithm will be useful in real-time video coding applications using MPEG-4 AVC or MPEG-2.

• Journal of the Institute of Electronics Engineers of Korea SP
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• v.41 no.6
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• pp.209-220
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• 2004

The main feature of H.264 standard against conventional video standards is the high coding efficiency and the network friendliness. In spite of these outstanding features, it is not easy to implement H.264 codec as a real-time system due to its high requirement of memory bandwidth and intensive computation. Although the variable block size motion compensation using multiple reference frames is one of the key coding tools to bring about its main performance gain, it demands substantial computational complexity due to SAD (Sum of Absolute Difference) calculation among all possible combinations of coding modes to find the best motion vector. For speedup of motion estimation process, therefore, this paper proposes fast algorithms for both integer-pel and fractional-pel motion search. Since many conventional fast integer-pel motion estimation algorithms are not suitable for H.264 having variable motion block sizes, we propose the motion field adaptive search using the hierarchical block structure based on the diamond search applicable to variable motion block sizes. Besides, we also propose fast fractional-pel motion search using small diamond search centered by predictive motion vector based on statistical characteristic of motion vector.

• The Journal of Korean Institute of Communications and Information Sciences
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• v.32 no.5C
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• pp.536-541
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• 2007

In video coding standard H.264/AVC, motion estimation using multiple reference pictures improves compression efficiency but the efficiency depends upon image content not the number of reference pictures. So, the motion estimation includes a large amount of computation of no worth according to image. This paper proposes fast motion estimation algorithm that removes worthless computation in the motion estimation using multiple reference pictures. The proposed algorithm classifies a block into valid and invalid blocks for the multiple reference pictures and removes the workless computation by applying a single reference picture to the invalid block. To estimate the proposed algorithm's performance, image quality, bit rate, and motion estimation time are compared with ones of the conventional algorithm in the reference software JM 9.5. The simulation results show that the proposed algorithm can considerably save about 38.67% the averaged motion estimation time while keeping the image quality and the bit rate, whose are average values are -0.02dB and -0.77% respectively, as good as the conventional algorithm.

• The Journal of Korean Institute of Communications and Information Sciences
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• v.29 no.9C
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• pp.1323-1329
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• 2004

This paper presents an enhanced MSEA(multi-level successive elimination algorithm) which is a fast algorithm of the full-search motion estimation. We predict the SAD at the final level using the values of norms at the preceding levels in MSEA and then decide on whether the processing at the following levels should be proceeded or not. We skip the computation at the following levels where the processing is not meaningful anymore. Consequently, we take computational gain. For the purpose of predicting the values of SAD at each level, we first show the theoretical analysis of the value of norm at each level, which is verified by experiments. Based on the analysis a new motion estimation method is proposed and its performance is evaluated.

• The Journal of Korean Institute of Communications and Information Sciences
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• v.32 no.1C
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• pp.9-15
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• 2007

We propose the fast full search algorithm that reduces the computation of the block matching algorithm which is used for motion estimation of the video coding. Since the conventional spiral search method starts searching at the center of the search window and then moves search point to estimate the motion vector pixel by pixel, it is good for the slow motion pictures. However the proposed method is good for the fast and slow motion because it estimates the motion in the new search order after partitioning the search window. Also, when finding the motion vector, this paper presents the method that reduces the complexity by computing the matching error in the order which is determined by local image complexity. The proposed algorithm reduces the computation up to 99% for block matching error compared with the conventional spiral full search algorithm without any loss of image quality.

• Proceedings of the Korean Information Science Society Conference
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• 2010.06a
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• pp.246-247
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• 2010

This paper proposes a fast motion estimation algorithm based on motion speed and multiple initial center points. The proposed method predicts initial search points by means of the spatio-temporal neighboring motion vectors. A dynamic search pattern based on motion speed and the predicted initial center points is proposed to quickly obtain the motion vector. Due to the usage of the spatio-temporal information and the dynamic search pattern, the proposed method greatly accelerates the search speed while maintaining a good predicted image quality. Experimental results show that the proposed method has a good predicted image quality in terms of PSNR with less search time as compared to the Full Search, New Three-Step Search, and Four-Step Search.

• Proceedings of the IEEK Conference
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• 2008.06a
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• pp.811-812
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• 2008

In this paper, a modified cross search algorithm for fast block matching motion estimation is proposed. Various Motion Estimation (ME) algorithms have been proposed since ME requires large computational complexity. The proposed algorithm employs Modified Cross Search Pattern (MCSP) to search the motion vector. Efficient compression can be achieved since Modified Cross Search Algorithm (MCSA) simplifies the search pattern to reduce the computational complexity. The experimental results show that proposed algorithm reduces the search points up to 29% compared to conventional methods.

• Proceedings of the Korea Institute of Convergence Signal Processing
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• 2001.06a
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• pp.177-180
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• 2001

This paper presents a new fast motion estimation algorithm for video coding. This method classifies blocks in a frame into moving blocks and background blocks, and then searches the best-matched blocks for only moving blocks. Experimental results show the effectiveness of the proposed method.

• Journal of KIISE:Computing Practices and Letters
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• v.16 no.12
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• pp.1219-1223
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• 2010

This paper proposes a fast motion estimation algorithm based on motion speed and multiple initial center points. The proposed method predicts initial search points by means of the spatio-temporal neighboring motion vectors. A dynamic search pattern based on the motion speed and the predicted initial center points is proposed to quickly obtain the motion vector. Due to the usage of the spatio-temporal information and the dynamic search pattern, the proposed method greatly accelerates the search speed while keeping a good predicted image quality. Experimental results show that the proposed method has a good predicted image quality in terms of PSNR with less searching time comparing with the Full Search, New Three-Step Search, and Four-Step Search.

• Journal of the Institute of Electronics Engineers of Korea SP
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• v.44 no.3
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• pp.16-22
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• 2007

Motion Estimation time in the H.264 has a large portion of encoding time and must be improved for real time application. Most of proposed motion estimation algorithm including Sub-pixel search use the fast search algorithm to speed up motion estimation by targeting the performance of full search in the reference code. This paper proposes a novel fast sub-pixel search control algorithm for H.264 encoder by using neighbor motion vector after analyzing the encoded Motion vector of video sequence. In addition the horizontal/vertical searching method is proposed with the horizontal/vertical directionality of motion vector. And the evaluation is performed with the proposed algorithms and other reference algorithms.