A Rate–Distortion Optimized Error-Resilient Algorithm for Multi-view Video Coding

In this paper, a new rate–distortion (R–D) optimized error-resilient scheme is proposed to improve error resilience for multi-view video transmission over lossy networks. Based on the study on the characteristics of multi-view video coding and the propagating behavior of channel errors, a recursive model to estimate the end-to-end distortion is first developed, in which the channel-induced distortion takes into consideration both motion and disparity compensation prediction. Then, based on the estimated distortion and the derived total bit rate, R–D optimized motion and disparity estimation are employed to find the reliable motion vector and disparity vector to achieve the optimum trade-off between prediction efficiency and error robustness. Finally, R–D optimization is applied again to perform coding mode decision, which explicitly considers intra, inter and inter-view prediction modes. Extensive experimental results demonstrate significant performance gains can be achieved for multi-view video communications against transmission errors.