A linear source model and a unified rate control algorithm for DCT video coding

We show that, in any typical transform coding systems, there is always a linear relationship between the coding bit rate R and the percentage of zeros among the quantized transform coefficients, denoted by p. Based on Shannon's source coding theorem, a theoretical justification is provided for this linear source model. The physical meaning of the model parameter is also discussed. We show that it is directly related to the image content and is a measure of picture complexity. In video coding, we propose an adaptive estimation scheme to estimate this model parameter. Based on the linear source model and the adaptive estimation scheme, a unified rate control algorithm is proposed for various standard video coding systems, such as MPEG-2, H.263, and MPEG-4. Our extensive simulation results show that the proposed rate control outperforms other algorithms reported in the literature by providing much more accurate and robust rate control.