An Encoder Complexity Reduction Scheme for Quality/Fidelity Scalable HEVC
Due to the compression performance of the latest coding standard known as high efficiency video coding (HEVC), there has been a significant interest in developing a scalable version to address industry's demand for cost effective universal access of digital media. One of the issues with the scalable extension of HEVC (known as SHVC) is its computational complexity. The focus of this study is on developing complexity reduction schemes for SHVC encoder with quality/fidelity scalability. In this paper, we propose a complexity reduction scheme for quality scalable extension of HEVC with two enhancement layers. The proposed scheme potentially can make coding/transmission of several different-quality versions of the same video content in one bit-stream an attractive proposition for the content delivery industry, allowing for cost effective digital media delivery to a variety of playback display devices. Performance evaluations confirm that the proposed complexity reduction scheme reduces total SHVC's encoding time by up to 51.95% while maintaining the overall quality of the coded streams.