Performance analysis of inter-layer prediction module for H.264/SVC

With the introduction of diverse variety of display resolutions and transmission channel capacities, the Joint Video Team (JVT) has developed a new scalable video coding standard (H264/SVC) as an extension of H.264/AVC. The SVC can compress numerous video sequences of various resolutions as a single bit-stream. The spatial scalability is mainly based on coding tools such as inter-layer predictions that offer a better coding efficiency. Consequently, for the enhancement layer, a thorough mode decision process based on the base layer mode predictions is performed on the Joint Scalable Video Model software implementation. In order to highlight the inter-layer's coding efficiency, several analyses were made using numerous HD sequences with different motion characteristics. In fact, in this paper we present the efficiency of different inter-layer prediction modes for spatial scalability. As a first step, analysis results show the significant role of inter-layer prediction process for coding efficiency. As a second step, role of each inter-layer prediction type is investigated. Simulations results show the important role of inter-layer intra prediction and inter-layer residual prediction when targeting a better coding efficiency.