A flexible hardware-oriented fast algorithm for motion estimation

This paper discusses the design of a fast algorithm for motion estimation with emphasis on hardware cost considerations, real-time application, network adaptation, and flexibility. To achieve the best trade-off among hardware cost, computational complexity, and distortion performance, we propose a multi-stage pixel-subsampling motion estimation algorithm. The algorithm has a lower hardware cost than Liu´s subsampling algorithm and the three-step hierarchical search algorithm (3SHS) in terms of data flow control, I/O bandwidth, and regularity. Its computational complexity is close to that of 3SHS and its distortion performance, which is better than that of Liu´s algorithm and 3SHS, is close to that of full search