Method and architecture design for motion compensated frame interpolation in high-definition video processing

In this paper, a novel, fast, and low complexity method is proposed for motion compensated frame interpolation (MCFI). Unlike previous works involving high complexity and complicated time-consuming iterations, the proposed method adopts one-pass and low-complexity approach without any repeated iteration and is capable of dealing with high definition (HD) video processing. The proposed method employs a unique true motion engine that explores at most nine motion candidates with different motion directions and then determines one true motion by referring to neighboring spatial information as well as temporal information. Besides, the proposed method introduces an adaptive overlapped block matching algorithm to enhance the searching accuracy and visual quality. An architecture design is also proposed, which employs a modified multi-level successive eliminate algorithm (MSEA) and has capability to reduce the heavy computation of full search. Experimental results show that the proposed algorithm provides better video quality than conventional methods and shows satisfying performance for HD1080p 30 fps at 180 MHz or HD720p 30 fps at 83 MHz.