H.264/AVC stereo video compression benchmarking

This paper presents a study on different techniques for stereo video compression using different view packing formats and benchmarking their performances. With “view packing” formats we intend the possibility to encapsulate in each single frame 2 views (Left and Right) together at lower resolution: in particular we will analyze the quality versus compression behavior of the following main packing schemes: temporal, spatial row/column, spatial side-by-side/up- down, half-flipping, checkerboard (quincunx). Any legacy H.264/AVC capable decoder is already able to decode the 2 packed views together, but it cannot understand autonomously what kind of receiving broadcast format it is decoding. This problem is addressed by the H.264 standard with the addition of stereo SEI message as part of Fidelity Extension Range: in this way the decoder will also be potentially able to adapt any stereo content to the native panel input data format required. Recently, H.264/MVC standard evolved as an extension to H.264 for multiple views coding exploiting multi view prediction and using a number of new techniques for better interview prediction.