Low complexity multiview video plus depth coding

Multiview video plus depth (MVD) is a new 3D video format that would support 3D applications developed by MPEG. Such a format is a combination of texture video and associated depth maps. Consequently, for the efficient transmission of 3D video signals, the compression of texture video and also the depth maps is required. Since high computational complexity of jointly coding between the texture video and depth map is still an open question, this paper introduces a low complexity MVD coding algorithm that adaptively utilizes the texture and depth map correlation. Based on the correlation, we propose four efficient techniques, including depth information based fast mode size decision, adaptive disparity estimation in texture coding, motion vector sharing based on the texture image similarity correlation and the SKIP mode decision in depth coding. Experimental results show that the proposed algorithm can significantly reduce the computational complexity of MVD coding while improve the coding performance and achieve better rendering quality¹.