VIDEO COMPRESSION FOR THE GRAND ALLIANCE - A HISTORICAL-PERSPECTIVE

This article outlines the evolution of the Grand Alliance (GA) high-definition television (HDTV) standard from its divided beginnings among several systems to its final state as the proposed standard for HDTV transmission in the United States today. Earlier video compression standards are briefly described, and their influence on the first four all-digital HDTV proposals is demonstrated. The salient features of each proposed video compression system are highlighted, and the more recent MPEG-2 compression standard is introduced. MPEG-2 was adopted as the basis for video compression by the GA, a group of the former HDTV competitors. The formation of the GA is described, and the work of its Video Compression Specialists Group on evaluating modifications to MPEG-2 is reviewed. (C) 1995 John Wiley and Sons, Inc.