Fast rate-distortion optimization in the H.264/AVC standard
Tea Anselmo, Daniele Alfonso · 2006
Rate-Distortion Optimization (RDO) is a new feature of JVT H.264/AVC video encoder that enables a substantial enhanced efficiency with respect to all previous video coding standards. However, RDO causes a considerable increase in encoding computational complexity, proportional to the square of the search window size when the Full-Search motion estimation algorithm is applied. In this paper, a fast block-based predictive-recursive motion estimation algorithm is illustrated in combination with RDO algorithms. Extensive simulations show that, using the proposed algorithms, the time devoted to RDO is significantly reduced while keeping performance extremely close to JVT reference software JM8.6.