FPGA-based design of a high-performance and modular video processing platform

In this paper, an FPGA-based design and implementation of a high-performance video processing platform (VPP) is presented. A hardware/software codesign system is proposed on Xilinx Virtex II Pro FPGA to realize complex algorithms for real-time image and video processing. This paper presents the framework of the VPP, discusses the architectural building blocks and FPGA synthesis results. Each hardware (custom accelerator blocks) and software (code running on an embedded CPU core) component is described comprehensively, laying the foundation for an adaptable and modular embedded system. As a case study, a real-time motion detection algorithm is implemented, demonstrating the feasibility of the proposed platform. Additional hardware accelerators can be easily plugged-in to the system for desired processing engines. VPP can be a robust, cost-effective solution for a broad range of multimedia applications including broadcasting and streaming video, video on-demand, video encoding/decoding, surveillance, detection and recognition.