Subjective quality assessment of mixed-resolution stereoscopic videos in 3D broadcasting

Various techniques have been developed for efficient compression of stereoscopic 3D videos. Mixed-resolution based approach is one representative bit-rate saving method based on the characteristics of human visual system that the mixed-resolution stereoscopic videos are perceived close to the higher resolution. However, when the difference between the left and right image resolutions is bigger than a certain threshold level, the perceived quality degradation of the 3D images occurs. In this work, we conducted the subjective quality assessments on the mixed-resolution 3D videos of SC-MMH, an ATSC 3D broadcasting system that saves bit-rate based on the aforementioned characteristics of human visual system, to find the optimum bit-rate distribution between left and right views. By analyzing the result, we also demonstrate that SC-MMH can provide the acceptable 3D services with the given bit-rate, 19.39Mbps of one 6MHz physical channel.