Influence of foveated vision on video quality perception

Efficiency of the video coding process, as well as accuracy of the objective video quality evaluation can be significantly improved by introducing the human visual system (HVS) characteristics. In this paper the usage of the foveation technique in the video quality assessment is analyzed. This technique takes into account non-uniform sampling that corresponds with the acquisition of visual information at the human retina. The highest visual sensitivity is at the point of fixation (foveation point) and it decreases rapidly with distance from that point. We have proposed a foveated video quality metric which gives lower weights to a high-frequency distortion in the regions away from the fixation point. The quality measures calculated by this metric are compared with the results obtained by subjective tests.