Spread and Iterative Search: A High Quality Motion Estimation Algorithm for High Definition Videos and Its VLSI Design

This paper presents the Spread and Iterative Search (S&IS) motion estimation algorithm, which uses a random spread evaluation together with a central iterative evaluation to avoid local minima falls and to increase the image quality for high definition videos. Considering Full HD videos, S&IS reached an average PSNR gain of 1.41dB when compared to Diamond Search (DS), with an increase of about four times in the number of evaluated blocks. When compared to Full Search (FS), the S&IS achieved an average PSNR loss of 1.56 dB, evaluating 73 times less blocks than FS. An efficient architecture for the S&IS algorithm is also presented in this paper. The architecture was designed targeting in real time processing (30 frames per seconds) for QFHD videos (3840×2160 pixels). The architecture was described in VHDL and synthesized for and Altera Stratix 4 FPGA and for ST90nm standard cells technology. Booth syntheses show that the architecture is able to process QFHD frames in real time. The standard cells version is able to reach also a good trade-off among area, memory and power consumption, processing QFHD videos with 62.2 mW.