Patent · US Expired

Device and method for smoothing picture signal, device and method for encoding picture and device and method for decoding picture

US6041145A · kind A · utility

184Cited by
3References
28Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateJul 15, 1998
Grant dateMar 21, 2000
Priority date
Expiry dateJul 15, 2018

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC H)Electricity
  • CPC primaryH04N19/82
  • WIPO fieldAudio-visual technology
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

A great decrease of a step, i.e., block distortion, of such as unnatural, abnormal or artifact brightness and color, on a block boundary, leads to much visual improvement of picture quality. Against a picture that has been encoded and decoded by block, the smoothing filter characteristics is changed according to quantizing parameter, block activity of a decoded picture, the activity of each pixel of the decoded picture, and the position with respect to a block boundary of a pixel. A smoothing filter utilizes a weighted mean whose weight is the inverse number of a difference between a target pixel and its surrounding pixels. The weighted mean is obtained by adding a certain number to a weight before taking its inverse number. The value to be added is controlled by the parameter. Similarly, the mixing ratio of a pixel value after performing the smoothing filter and a decoded pixel value is changed depending on the parameter. A filter having strong edge preserving property is utilized for the inside of a block, and a filter having weak edge preserving property is utilized for a block boundary. A filter having edge preserving property is utilized for the post/loop filter.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.