Adaptive rate control for H.264/AVC using Kalman filter

This paper proposes a new algorithm for H.264 rate control. First, we estimate the frame target bit based on the proportional-integral-derivative (RAPID) buffer control to avoid the buffer overflow or underflow. With the frame target bit, we use the quadratic R-D model to estimate the frame quantization parameter (QP). Finally, we apply Kalman filter to further dynamically adjust macroblock QP to achieve accurate bit rate while maximizing the picture quality and simultaneously handling buffer fullness. In comparison with JM7.6, our scheme provides better video quality with reduced PSNR variations and less buffer overflow/underflow even at low bit rate. Most of all, our scheme also achieves an average PSNR gain of 0.127dB and generates coding bits close to target bits due to the accurate MB QP of Kalman filter estimator