Encoding and decoding selectively retrievable representations of video content

摘要

A system and method disposed to enable encoding, decoding and manipulation of digital video with substantially less processing load than would otherwise required. In particular, one disclosed method is directed to generating a compressed video data structure that is selectively decodable to a plurality of resolutions including the full resolution of the uncompressed stream. The desired number of data components and the content of the data components that make up the compressed video data, which determine the available video resolutions, are variable based upon the processing carried out and the resources available to decode and process the data components. During decoding, efficiency is substantially improved because only the data components necessary to generate a desired resolution are decoded. In variations, both temporal and spatial decoding are utilized to reduce frame rates, and hence, further reduce processor load. The system and method are particularly useful for real-time video editing applications.

主权项

1. A method for processing compressed video data, the method comprising:
storing, in a storage structure, for each of a plurality of frames of video, a corresponding plurality of image components representative of the frame of video, the frame of video comprising a corresponding image at an original resolution, the plurality of image components including a base image component associated with a lowest resolution and one or more additional image components associated with resolutions greater than or equal to the lowest resolution and less than or equal to the original resolution, and the base image component comprising the corresponding image at the lowest resolution; selecting a first display resolution at which to display a first frame of video based on a first processing load of a decoder; retrieving a first subset of the image components corresponding to the first frame of video from the storage structure selected based on the first display resolution, the first subset of image components including the base image component corresponding to the first frame of video; decoding the retrieved first subset of image components to generate a first modified frame of video comprising the image corresponding to the first frame of video at the first display resolution; displaying the first modified frame of video; in response to a change in processing load of the decoder to a second processing load, selecting a second display resolution at which to display a second frame of video based on the second processing load; retrieving a second subset of the image components corresponding to the second frame of video from the storage structure selected based on the second display resolution, the second subset of image components including the base image component corresponding to the second frame of video; decoding the retrieved second subset of image components to generate a second modified frame of video comprising the image corresponding to the second frame of video at the second display resolution; and displaying the second modified frame of video.