Patent application number | Description | Published |
20080232465 | SYSTEM AND METHOD OF FAST MPEG-4/AVC QUANTIZATION - A system and method for coding moving pictures according to MPEG-4/AVC is described which performs rapid quantization of the transformed residue signal is described. The system and method may employ a number of techniques, which may be considered separately or in combination, including: extreme macroblock (MB) analysis, pre-execution table generation, conditional skipping, and picture level scaling. For example, MBs are detected wherein the quantization scale is adapted prior to quantization processing. The quantization process can be skipped for DCT coefficients which do not meet a threshold criterion. Weighted quantization can be readily performed in response to generating sets of scaled quantization tables in the beginning of encoding each picture, wherein the quantization scale of the DCT coefficients need not be scaled in response to position. | 09-25-2008 |
20090074058 | CODING TOOL SELECTION IN VIDEO CODING BASED ON HUMAN VISUAL TOLERANCE - In one embodiment, a coding mode selection method is provided to improve the visual quality of an encoded video sequence. The coding mode is selected based on a human visual tolerance level. Picture data may be received for a video coding process. The picture data is then analyzed to determine human visual tolerance adjustment information. For example, parameters of a cost equation may be adjusted based on the human visual tolerance level, which may be a tolerance that is based on a distortion bound that the human visual system can tolerate. The picture data may be analyzed in places that are considered visually sensitive areas, such as trailing suspicious areas, stripping suspicious areas, picture boundary areas, and/or blocking suspicious areas. Depending on what kind of visually sensitive area is found in the picture data, a parameter in a cost equation may be adjusted based on different visual tolerance thresholds. The coding mode is then determined based on the cost. | 03-19-2009 |
20090262800 | Block based codec friendly edge detection and transform selection - Low complexity edge detection and DCT type selection method to improve the visual quality of H.264/AVC encoded video sequence is described. Encoding-generated information is reused to detect an edge macroblock. Variance and Mean Absolute Difference (MAD) of one macroblock shows a certain relationship that is able to be used to differentiate the edge macroblock and the non-edge macroblock. Also, the variance difference of neighbor macroblocks provides a hint for edge existence. Then, a block-based edge detection method uses this information. To determine the DCT type for each block, the detected edges are differentiated as visual obvious edge, texture-like edge, soft edge and strong edge. 8×8 DCT is used for texture-like edges and the 4×4 DCT is used for all the other edges. The result is an efficient and accurate edge detection and transform selection method. | 10-22-2009 |
20100027905 | System and method for image and video encoding artifacts reduction and quality improvement - Reducing artifacts and improving quality for image and video encoding is performed in one pass to preserve natural edge smoothness and sharpness. To reduce artifacts and improve quality, several steps are implemented including spatial variation extraction, determining if a block is flat or texture/edge, classifying the pixels as texture or noise, detecting a dominant edge, checking the spatial variation of neighboring blocks, generating base weights, generating filter coefficients, filtering pixels and adaptive enhancement. A device which utilizes the method of reducing artifacts and improving quality achieves higher quality images and/or video with reduced artifacts. | 02-04-2010 |
20100067818 | System and method for high quality image and video upscaling - A low complexity upscaling method to generate higher resolution image and video with high quality is described herein. Natural edge smoothness and sharpness are preserved while overshooting artifacts and the “edge dilation” problem are eliminated. To obtain edge smoothness and remove jaggy artifacts along the edge, a bi-directional filtering which is based on two orthogonal directions is used to generate higher resolution pixels. The direction close to the edge direction is heavily weighted, and the direction far from the edge direction is lightly weighted. The weight of each direction is determined by the developed directional vector difference measurement method. To eliminate the overshooting artifacts and solving the thick edge problem, a dual-sided interpolation method is implemented. By using the dual-sided interpolation method, the interpolation result is pushed towards a dominant transition desired location which removes overshooting artifacts. A thin and sharp edge is obtained instead of a blurred, thick edge. | 03-18-2010 |
20100253817 | ORIENTATION-BASED APPROACH FOR FORMING A DEMOSAICED IMAGE, AND FOR COLOR CORRECTING AND ZOOMING THE DEMOSAICED IMAGE - A method and apparatus for forming a demosaiced image from a color-filter-array (“CFA”) image is provided. The CFA image comprises a first set of pixels colored according to a first (e.g., a green) color channel, a second set of pixels colored according to a second (e.g., a red) color channel and a third set of pixels colored according to a third (e.g., blue) color channel. The method may include obtaining an orientation map, which includes, for each pixel of the color-filter-array image, an indicator of orientation of an edge bounding such pixel. The method may further include interpolating the first color channel at the second and third sets of pixels as a function of the orientation map so as to form a fourth set of pixels. The method may also include interpolating the second color channel at the first and third sets of pixels as a function of the orientation map and the fourth set of pixels; and interpolating the third color channel at the first and second sets of pixels as a function of the orientation map and the fourth set of pixels. | 10-07-2010 |
20100321513 | CONTENT ADAPTIVE DETECTION OF IMAGES WITH STAND-OUT OBJECT - Content adaptive detection of images having stand-out objects involves block variance-based detection and determining if an object includes a stand-out object. The images with a stand-out object are further processed to isolate an object of interest. The images without a detected stand-out object are further processed with a transition map-based detection method which includes generating a transition map. If an object portrait is determined from the transition map, then the image is further processed to isolate the object of interest. | 12-23-2010 |
20100321531 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR IMAGE QUALITY ENHANCEMENT BY REDUCING THE EFFECTS OF AIR POLLUTION AND HAZE - A low cost image quality enhancement method to be utilized in an ordinary consumer camera and for post processing of an existing image database is described herein. The quality enhancement is transferred into an adaptive intensity stretching process in the YUV domain. A different enhancement process is designed for a luminance (Y) channel and chrominance (UV) channel. The parameters in the enhancement process are estimated based on the contents of the image. After the stretching-based enhancement, an adaptive unsharp masking process is applied to the luminance data. The quality is significantly improved for the images shot under unfavorable conditions. | 12-23-2010 |
20110069884 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR "BOKEH-AJI" SHOT DETECTION AND REGION OF INTEREST ISOLATION - A “Bokeh-Aji” image is one in which the region of interest is in focus and the background is out of focus. Detection of “Bokeh-Aji” type images and then isolation to the region of interest area in a low complexity way without any human intervention is beneficial. A set of tools for performing this task include SAD and high pass filtering based in-focus/out-of-focus area separation, in-focus/out-of-focus block distribution based “Bokeh-Aji” shot detection and region of interest isolation. By effectively integrating these tools together, the “Bokeh-Aji” images are successfully identified, and the region of interest area is successfully isolated. | 03-24-2011 |
20110135003 | UNI-MODAL BASED FAST HALF-PEL AND FAST QUARTER-PEL REFINEMENT FOR VIDEO ENCODING - A method of half-pixel interpolation and quarter-pixel interpolation are adapted for reducing the impact of aliasing within motion estimation. To estimate a motion vector with quarter-pixel accuracy more efficiently, the improved method is able to skip checking certain points using the uni-modal assumption. In an embodiment, a diamond based refinement is implemented. Within the diamond based refinement are half-pel refinement and quarter-pel refinements. Furthermore, within the half-pel refinement are methods for on-the-fly interpolation and pre-computed interpolation. Within quarter-pel refinement, the method depends on whether four neighbor half-pel points are checked or just one or two half-pel points. Moreover, within each of the different embodiments is the ability to focus on quality or speed wherein different methods are implemented to maximize the desired function. In another embodiment, a square based refinement is implemented. | 06-09-2011 |
20110222778 | COLOR AND INTENSITY BASED MEANINGFUL OBJECT OF INTEREST DETECTION - An apparatus and method for detecting “Object Portraits” (photographs or images with a stand-out object of interest or a set of stand-out objects of interest) is described. A set of tools has been developed for object of interest detection, including “Sunset-like” scene detection, pseudo-color saturation-based detection and object of interest isolation, block intensity based detection and object of interest isolation. By effectively integrating these tools together, the “Object Portrait” images and “Non-Object Portrait” images are successfully identified. Meaningful object of interest areas are thereby successfully isolated in a low complexity manner without human intervention. | 09-15-2011 |
20120141019 | REGION DESCRIPTION AND MODELING FOR IMAGE SUBSCENE RECOGNITION - A method and apparatus is described here that categorizes images by extracting regions and describing the regions with a 16-dimensional subscene feature vector, which is a concatenation of color, texture, and spatial feature vectors. By comparing the spatial feature vectors in images with similarly-obtained feature vectors in a Gaussian mixture based model pool (obtained in a subscene modeling phase), the images may be categorized (in a subscene recognition phase) with probabilities relating to each region or subscene. Higher probabilities are likelier correlations. The device may be a single or multiple core CPU, or parallelized vector processor for characterizing many images. The images may be photographs, videos, or video stills, without restriction. When used real-time, the method may be used for visual searching or sorting. | 06-07-2012 |
20120155752 | GEOMETRIC FEATURE BASED IMAGE DESCRIPTION AND FAST IMAGE RETRIEVAL - An apparatus and method for processing pictures (images, graphics or video frames) for image representation and comparison on the basis of a geometric feature description built from histograms of pseudo-color saturation. The feature description can also include normalized centroid variance, as well as an intensity map. The descriptions allow various matching comparisons to be performed between an input image and a set of comparison images, such as to find matching (or mismatching, or other relationship) images. The comparison can be sped using staged comparisons, whereby an image failing one level of comparison need not be considered in subsequent phases. A set of efficient image feature descriptors are described for use in a fast image retrieval scheme, which is efficient for searching of images spanning different image types, rotations and scales. | 06-21-2012 |
20120155766 | PATCH DESCRIPTION AND MODELING FOR IMAGE SUBSCENE RECOGNITION - A method and apparatus is described that categorizes images by extracting regions and describing the regions with a set of 15-dimensional image patch feature vectors, which are concatenations of color and texture feature vectors. By comparing the image patch feature vectors in images with similarly-obtained image patch vectors in a Gaussian mixture based model pool (obtained in an image patch modeling phase), the images may be categorized (in an image patch recognition phase) with probabilities relating to each image patch. Higher probabilities are likelier correlations. The device may be a single or multiple core CPU, or parallelized vector processor for characterizing many images. The images may be photographs, videos, or video stills, without restriction. When used real-time, the method may be used for visual searching or sorting. | 06-21-2012 |
20120163706 | SHAPE DESCRIPTION AND MODELING FOR IMAGE SUBSCENE RECOGNITION - A method and apparatus is described here that categorizes images by extracting a subscene and describing the subscene with a top level feature vector and a division feature vector, which are descriptions of edge gradient classifications within rectangular bounding boxes. By filtering subscene feature vectors in images with a Gaussian mixture based model pool (obtained in a subscene modeling phase), the images may be categorized (in an subscene recognition phase) with probabilities relating to each subscene. Higher probabilities are likelier correlations. The device may be a single or multiple core CPU, or parallelized vector processor for characterizing many images. The images may be photographs, videos, or video stills, without restriction. When used real-time, the method may be used for visual searching or sorting. | 06-28-2012 |
20120195366 | Method and Apparatus of Adaptive Inter Mode Coding Using Variable Length Codes - A method and apparatus for adaptive inter prediction mode coding are disclosed. In the current HEVC, a fixed set of variable length codes is used for the underlying video data, which may not optimally match the statistics of underlying video data. Consequently, the compression efficiency associated with the fixed set of variable length codes will be compromised. Accordingly, an adaptive coding scheme for inter prediction modes is disclosed. The variable length codes used for each inter prediction mode in each coding unit depth is adaptively determined by its respective statistics. The statistics can be measured as the frequency of occurrence of each mode. In one embodiment according to the present invention, counters are used to collect the statistics. According to one embodiment of the present invention, the statistics of inter prediction modes are collected from the previous slice and the set of variable length codes is determined for the subsequent slice (immediately following the previous slice) accordingly. According to another embodiment of the present invention, the statistics of inter prediction modes are updated for each coding unit and the variable length code for each mode is adjusted according to the statistics change during the coding process. According to another embodiment of the present invention, the variable length code for each mode is reset in the beginning of each slice. The reset code word table is either a predefined code word table for whole sequence or a code word table determined by the previous slice. | 08-02-2012 |
20120263356 | METHOD FOR EFFICIENT REPRESENTATION AND PROCESSING OF COLOR PIXEL DATA IN DIGITAL PATHOLOGY IMAGES - Efficient representation of color digital pathology images (DPI) is described herein, which is accomplished by exploiting properties unique to such images. The method decomposes the data into constituent parts whose relative importance is able to be specified, allowing the data to be accurately represented with less bit precision, less spatial resolution or less spectral resolution. Two specific areas where the method is able to be utilized include: (1) more-efficient image compression; and (2) more efficient processing of the data. Efficient image compression is accomplished by assigning fewer bits to less-important colors. Efficient data processing is accomplished by processing only those colors, or combinations of colors, that are deemed important. | 10-18-2012 |
20130216134 | System And Method For Effectively Performing A Scene Representation Procedure - A system for performing a scene representation procedure includes an image manager that processes source images from a given scene to define subscenes in the source images. The image manager creates an image understanding graph for each of the source images, and also creates a scene representation graph for each of the source images based upon the corresponding subscenes and certain image characteristics. The image manager further generates an integrated scene representation to represent all of the source images with a single representation. A processor of an electronic device controls the image manager to perform the scene representation procedure. | 08-22-2013 |
20130266064 | Method and Apparatus for Intra Mode Coding in HEVC - A method and apparatus for Intra prediction mode encoding or decoding based on multi-level most probable modes (MPMs) are disclosed. In one embodiment according to the present invention, the method and apparatus for encoding or decoding Intra prediction mode for 4×4 prediction unit (PU) use 19 Intra mode candidates to have full directional coverage or 35 Intra mode candidates as used by 8×8, 16×16 and 32×32 PUs. In another embodiment of the present invention, three MPMs are used to code the Intra modes. Various methods to derive the three MPMs based on the Intra modes of neighboring blocks are disclosed. In yet another embodiment of the present invention, the coding method for the remaining modes comprises fixed length coding. In addition, variable length coding for the remaining modes are also disclosed. | 10-10-2013 |
20140016853 | METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR STAIN SEPARATION USING VECTOR ANALYSIS - A computer-implemented method and apparatus for stain separation of a pathology image using stain vector analysis comprising converting an original image into an optical domain image, performing stain vector analysis on the optical domain image to obtain one or more stain vectors, deconvoluting the vectors adaptively to produce one or more separated stain images. | 01-16-2014 |
20140112568 | METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR AUTOMATIC HER2 SCORING OF TISSUE SAMPLES - Certain aspects of an apparatus and method for method and apparatus for automatic HER2 scoring of tissue samples may include for determining a cancer diagnosis score comprising identifying one or more nuclei in a slide image of a tissue sample, determine one or more membrane strengths in the slide image surrounding each of the one or more nuclei, classifying one or more cells, each corresponding to the one or more nuclei, in a class among a plurality of classes according to the one or more membrane strengths and determining a cancer diagnosis score based on a percentage of cells classified in each of the plurality of classes. | 04-24-2014 |
20140112569 | METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR AUTOMATIC CANCER DIAGNOSIS SCORING OF TISSUE SAMPLES - Certain aspects of an apparatus and method for automatic ER/PR scoring of tissue samples may include for determining a cancer diagnosis score comprising identifying a positive stained nucleus in a slide image of the tissue sample, identifying a negative stained nucleus in the slide image, computing a proportion score based on number of the positive stained nucleus identified and number of the negative stained nucleus identified and determining the cancer diagnosis score based on the proportion. | 04-24-2014 |
20140140404 | METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR INTRA PREDICTION USING NON-SQUARE BLOCKS - A method and apparatus for Intra prediction of a block based on neighboring pixels around the block are disclosed. Embodiments according to the present invention use square blocks as well as non-square blocks for Intra prediction. For a 2N×2N Luma CU (coding unit), the CU can be partitioned into 2N×N, N×2N, 2N×2N or N×N PUs. The 2N×N and N×2N PUs can be further processed by either square transforms only or both non-square and square transforms. In one embodiment, the 2N×N PU or the N×2N PU is processed as two N×N TUs (transform units) and each of the N×N TU is further split into smaller N×N TUs based on quad-tree split. In another embodiment, the 2N×N and N×2N PUs are processed as two 2N×0.5N and 0.5N×2N TUs respectively. | 05-22-2014 |
20140177728 | METHOD AND SYSTEM OF TRANSFORM BLOCK PROCESSING ACCORDING TO QUANTIZATION MATRIX IN VIDEO CODING - A method and system for processing transform blocks according to quantization matrices in a video coding system are disclosed. Embodiments of the present invention derive one or more derived quantization matrices from one or more initial quantization matrices or from one previously derived quantization matrix. In one embodiment, the initial quantization matrices include a 4×4 and 8×8 quantization matrices, which can be either default or user-defined. All quantization matrices larger than 8×8 can be derived from the 4×4 and 8×8 initial quantization matrices. Non-square quantization matrices can be derived from at least one initial square quantization matrix or at least one derived square quantization matrix. Individual initial quantization matrices may be used to derive respective larger quantization matrices. Furthermore, the individual initial quantization matrices may be derived from larger quantization matrices designed for corresponding transform sizes. Syntax design to enable the quantization matrix representation is also disclosed. | 06-26-2014 |
20140211850 | METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR PREDICTION MODE AND PARTITION MODE SYNTAX CODIND FOR CODING UNITS IN HEVC - A method and apparatus for coding of syntax elements are disclosed to allow prediction units in P and B slices to share the same syntax coding table. In one embodiment according to the present invention, the method and apparatus coding of syntax elements selectively apply a syntax coding table to encode or decode the syntax element associated with the partition mode of a coding unit of a picture region according to the slice type of the picture region. A first syntax coding table is used to process the syntax element if the slice type is an I mode and a second syntax coding table is used to process the syntax element if the slice type is not an I mode. | 07-31-2014 |