Block shuffling on top of error concealment for wireless image transmissions

Nowadays the image and video compression standards employ variable length coding (VLC). One disadvantage of using VLC is that whenever an error occurs, it propagates until the next resynchronization can be achieved. Error propagation under fading conditions makes severe destruction in a bundle of blocks within an image. In such situations, error concealment may not perform well due to the missing information in consecutive blocks. In this paper, block shuffling is proposed for the purpose of randomizing the blocks' location so as to minimize the chance of getting groups of error blocks. Image transmissions under AWGN and fading channels are simulated and the enhancement of the error concealment performance is investigated.