Source:
Convener of MPEG
Status:
Approved by WG11
Subject:
MPEG Press Release
Date:
2008 July 25
ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11 N9965
July 2008 – Hannover, DE
Source: |
Convener of MPEG |
|
Status: |
Approved by WG11 |
|
Subject: |
MPEG Press Release |
|
Date: |
2008 July 25 |
Hannover, DE – The 85th MPEG meeting was held in Hannover, Germany from 21 July to 25 July 2008.
Multiview Video Coding Finalized
Multiview Video Coding (MVC), which provides a compressed video format suitable for applications such as high-quality stereo and 3D video, has reached the Final Draft Amendment status (ISO/IEC 14496-10:200X Ammendment 1) at the co-located 85th MPEG and 28th Joint Video Team (JVT) meetings. MVC enables these exciting new applications by exploiting the similarities between multiple-camera video captures of a scene, a scenario becoming more common in today’s world due to the decreasing cost of cameras and the advent of suitable 3D displays. By eliminating redundant information across camera views, MVC achieves a reduction in bit rate of approximately 20% on average, when compared to the more traditional method of encoding views from each camera separately.
The new Multiview High Profile as defined in the MVC amendment uses the same coding tools as supported by the previous High Profile (HP) of the MPEG-4 AVC standard. Level constraints for this profile have also been specified so that fixed decoder resources of single-view AVC decoders, such as memory, could be repurposed for decoding stereo and multiview video bitstreams. Moreover, MVC is backwards compatible in the sense that one view (the so-called base-view) can be decoded from a part of the MVC stream by using a HP decoder, which could then be output on a conventional monoscopic display. An MVC decoder would generate multiple output views from the full stream and forward them to a stereoscopic or multiscopic display.
Call for Proposals Issued for Video Signature Tools
At its 85th meeting, MPEG has issued a Call for Proposals for a new amendment to the MPEG-7 Visual standard (ISO/IEC 15938-3), for the purpose of standardizing the description of video data by very compact, unique and quickly searchable signature description tools. This technology is expected to support the finding of identical video content, even when a copy has been modified, for example, by re-encoding of the content, colour change or filtering manipulations, and other common editing operations such as changing time bases, cutting in a timeline or changing the frame size or viewing window. Potential user scenarios include finding duplicate video content across databases, associating modified video content with metadata of its origin, monitoring of usage, and identifying lost or stolen items by photographs. To start an evaluation based on rigorous testing, a large dataset of video clips has been collected. Responses to the CfP are expected prior to the 87th MPEG meeting (February 2009), and will be evaluated during that meeting. The new MPEG Call for Proposals for video signature tools be found at http://www.chiariglione.org/mpeg/hot_news.htm.
MPEG-4 Enhanced Low Delay AAC Delivers Quality Performance
At its 85th meeting, MPEG issued the Verification Test Report for MPEG-4 Enhanced Low Delay AAC (AAC-ELD, ISO/IEC 14496:2005/AMD 9), the newest MPEG standard for high quality conversational applications. Test results showed that the AAC-ELD provides quality and compression performance that is superior to all competing technologies.
AAC-ELD is based on MPEG-4 AAC Low Delay (AAC-LD, ISO/IEC 14496:2005) audio coding tools and adds recently developed MPEG-4 coding tools. Most notably, it incorporates the Spectral Band Replication tool (SBR), but in a form that provides significantly reduced algorithmic delay, thus delivering excellent compression with a low latency that supports conversational applications. At low bit rates (~32kbps), the test results showed that the AAC-ELD technology offers significantly better audio quality when compared to both AAC-LD and ITU communication codec G.722.1-C. At higher bitrates (~64kbps), AAC-ELD performed at the same quality level as its predecessor, AAC-LD, while offering a 25% lower algorithmic delay of just 15ms.
The immediate applications of this standard are foreseen to be in high quality conferencing systems as well as in professional broadcasting equipment, where the MPEG-4 AAC-LD codec is already established.
The verification test report for Advanced Audio Coding – Enhanced Low Delay can be found at http://www.chiariglione.org/mpeg/hot_news.htm.
Unified Speech and Audio Coding Work Begins
At the 85th meeting, responses to the Call for Proposals on Unified Speech and Audio Coding were evaluated. The goal of this work is to achieve, across a range of bitrates for speech, music, and mixed speech and music content types, performance which is as good as or better than the best state-of-the-art codecs and also to have consistently high performance across content types.
Evaluation was based on a comprehensive set of 9 listening tests assessing audio quality for mono and stereo signals at bitrates ranging from 64 kb/s for stereo to 12 kb/s for mono. Many submissions achieved very high performance, with five of these submissions scoring within 4 points of the best system on the 100-point MUSHRA subjective quality scale. The technology selected as the Reference Model had performance better than either of two state-of-the-art codecs (AMR-WB+ and HE-AAC V2) at every operating point tested.
The Working Draft text, normative decoder source code and informative encoder source code for the Unified Speech and Audio Coding specification will be available at the 86th MPEG meeting, at which point the collaborative phase of standardization will begin.
Other Notable Accomplishments of the 85th Meeting
Frame Based Animation Compression of 3D Graphics Objects
The standardization of a new compression tool, called Frame Based Animation Mesh Compression (FAMC) has been finalized by MPEG. In contrast with existing MPEG-4 3D animation tools that are based on high level control mechanisms such as the human skeleton, this new tool may be used for representing the result of any type of 3D deformation in a compressed manner. Content creators may use any technique proposed by their authoring tools for deforming 3D meshes. FAMC directly encodes the vertex positions and attributes over time. Analogous to video coding when compression is performed on pixel color, FAMC encodes displacements and attributes (such as colors) of the vertices in the mesh.
New Profiles for MPEG Lossless Audio Coding Standards Now Available
Two new profiles for the MPEG lossless audio coding standards have been proposed as a response to strong request by the industry. The ALS Baseline Profile incorporates Audio Lossless Coding (ALS), while the High Definition AAC (HD-AAC) Profile is a combination of AAC LC and Scalable Lossless Coding (SLS). The profiles will facilitate commercialization and expand market share of these MPEG technologies.
Contact MPEG
Digging Deeper Once Again
Communicating the large and sometimes complex array of technology that the MPEG Committee has developed is not a simple task. The experts past and present have contributed a series of white-papers that explain each of these standards individually. The repository is growing with each meeting, so if something you are interested is not there yet, it may appear there shortly - but do not hesitate to request it as well. You can start your MPEG adventure at: http://www.chiariglione.org/mpeg/mpeg-tech.htm
Further Information
Future MPEG meetings are planned as follows:
For further information about MPEG, please contact:
Dr. Leonardo Chiariglione (Convener of MPEG, Italy)
Via Borgionera, 103
10040 Villar Dora (TO), Italy
Tel +39 011 935 04 61
Email: mailto:leonardo@chiariglione.org
or
Dr. Arianne T. Hinds
Ricoh | IBM InfoPrint Solutions Company
6300 Diagonal Highway, MS 04N
Boulder, CO 80301, USA
Tel +1 303 924 6984
Email: arianne@us.ibm.com
This press release and other MPEG-related information can be found on the MPEG homepage:
http://www.chiariglione.org/mpeg
The text and details related to the Call mentioned above (together with other current Calls) are in the Hot News section, http://www.chiariglione.org/mpeg/hot_news.htm. These documents include information on how to respond the Calls.
The MPEG homepage also has links to other MPEG pages which are maintained by the MPEG subgroups. It also contains links to public documents that are freely available for download by non-MPEG members.
Journalists that wish to receive MPEG Press Releases by email can contact Dr. Arianne T. Hinds using the contact information provided above.