An effective de-interlacing technique using motion compensated interpolation

We propose a new de-interlacing algorithm using motion compensated interpolation. In the proposed scheme, motion estimation is first performed between the same parity fields, i.e., the previous and the next field, and then the motion vector is refined in the interpolated field. In conventional motion compensated schemes, a pre-filter such as line averaging is applied to interpolate missing lines before the motion estimation between the opposite parity fields. The proposed scheme does not require the pre-filter because block matching is performed between the same parity fields. For further improvement, a five-point median filter with temporal emphasis is used to reduce the interpolation error caused by incorrect motion. Computer simulation results indicate that the proposed scheme provides a better visual performance than conventional de-interlacing algorithms.