Neighbor context processing in block processing pipelines

摘要

A block processing pipeline in which blocks are input to and processed according to row groups so that adjacent blocks on a row are not concurrently at adjacent stages of the pipeline. A stage of the pipeline may process a current block according to neighbor pixels from one or more neighbor blocks. Since adjacent blocks are not concurrently at adjacent stages, the left neighbor of the current block is at least two stages downstream from the stage. Thus, processed pixels from the left neighbor can be passed back to the stage for use in processing the current block without the need to wait for the left neighbor to complete processing at a next stage of the pipeline. In addition, the neighbor blocks may include blocks from the row above the current block. Information from these neighbor blocks may be passed to the stage from an upstream stage of the pipeline.

主权项

1. An apparatus, comprising:
a block processing pipeline comprising a plurality of stages, each stage configured to perform one or more operations on a block of pixels passing through the pipeline; wherein the apparatus is configured to process blocks of pixels from a frame in the block processing pipeline so that adjacent blocks on a row are not concurrently at adjacent stages of the pipeline; wherein at least one stage of the block processing pipeline is configured to:
receive, from an upstream stage of the pipeline, a current block of pixels for processing at the stage;process the current block according to neighbor pixels from one or more neighbor blocks of the current block that were input to the pipeline for processing at pipeline cycles prior to input of the current block to the pipeline, wherein the neighbor pixels include left neighbor pixels from a left neighbor block of the current block received from a downstream stage of the pipeline, wherein the left neighbor block was input to the pipeline for processing at least three pipeline cycles prior to the current block; andoutput the processed current block to a next stage in the pipeline.