The world of multimedia and visual entertainment has grown in leaps and bounds in the past decade with 3-D television being one of the biggest... Show moreThe world of multimedia and visual entertainment has grown in leaps and bounds in the past decade with 3-D television being one of the biggest technologies. Amongst several formats proposed for representing 3-D content, multi- view video plus depth (MVD) format has gained a lot of interest in the past few years. MVD requires that each view of a particular scene be accompanied by a per-pixel depth. This introduces new problems for compression and transmission of MVD content because a depth map has di erent characteristics from a color image. Keeping the MVD format and depth map characteristics in mind, we highlight three majors problems that plague the MVD format, namely, 1. depth map re nement. 2. depth map compression. 3. novel view synthesis using the depth map at the decoder side. In order to re ne a depth map, we propose a multi-resolution anisotropic di usion algorithm that is optimized to run in real-time thus ensuring that the encoder does not su er from additional latency. Next, we propose two unique solutions for compressing them. We rst propose a solution using the Layered Depth Video (LDV) concept using a rate-distortion optimized quadtree decomposition of the LDV using a novel two-mode block truncation code with improved prediction. We also propose a compression solution using compressive sensing (CS) concepts by creating a hybrid rate-optimized CS codec. This codec achieves two goals:- rstly, block classi cation to ensure lower decoder complexity and secondly, rate-distortion optimization of the measurement rate for each block that is to be compressively sensed. We then look at the view synthesis component of the MVD tool-chain which x is a time-sensitive process. Keeping decoding latency in mind, we propose a lookup- table based approach to the 3-D warping process with a simpli ed hole- lling algorithm that is not only competitive quality-wise with other schemes but is several times faster too. It is hopeful that the presented techniques can be used successfully to create MVD architectures for applications that need low-complexity encoding solutions. PH.D in Electrical Engineering, May 2014 Show less
