An efficient low random-access delay panorama-based multiview video coding scheme

We present an efficient low random delay scheme for multiview video coding (MVC). In the proposed scheme, inter-view prediction (disparity estimation), which introduces time-consuming computations and random access delay to MVC, is replaced with a residue-stream coding process. Our algorithm transforms the middle view to a panoramic view of the scene. Then the residue streams are created as the difference of the luma and chroma values of overlapping regions of each view and the panoramic view. Finally the panoramic stream and all residue streams are encoded separately (simulcast coding). The hierarchical B picture prediction structure is implemented for coding each stream. Performance evaluations show that our proposed coding method outperforms the recent multiview video coding standard by up to 2.13 dB PSNR and enhances the compression ratio by 24.6%, while reducing random-access delay by 50%.