Patent ID: 8693538
Filing Date: 2014-04-08
Classification: H04N

Abstract:
1. A digital video decoding system, the system comprising: a decoder (including a combination of hardware and software) configured to decode a received digital video signal, which is coded in a scalable video coding format supporting temporal scalability and at least one of spatial and quality scalability, wherein the scalable video coding format for spatial scalability includes a base spatial and at least one spatial enhancement layer, for quality scalability includes a base quality layer and at least one quality enhancement layer, and for temporal scalability includes a base temporal layer and at least one temporal enhancement layer, wherein the base temporal layers and enhancement temporal layers are interlinked by a threaded picture prediction structure for at least one of the spatial or quality scalability layers, wherein, for decoding a picture at a target spatial or quality layer higher than the corresponding base layer, the decoder is configured to use coded information from a spatial or quality layer of said picture lower than the target layer in the threaded prediction structure when a portion of the target layer's coded information is lost or not available, wherein the digital video decoding system is disposed in a receiving endpoint, the system further comprising: a linking communication network; a conferencing server linked to the receiving endpoint and at least one transmitting endpoint by at least one communication channel each over the communication network, and at least one endpoint that transmits the coded digital video that is coded in the scalable video coding format, wherein the conferencing server is configured to selectively eliminate portions of input video signals received from transmitting endpoints that correspond to layers higher than the base spatial or quality layer, prior to creating an output video signal that is forwarded to the receiving endpoint, wherein the conferencing server linked to the receiving endpoint and at least one transmitting endpoint is one of: a Transcoding Multipoint Control Unit using cascaded decoding and encoding; a Switching Multipoint Control Unit by selecting which input to transmit as output; a Scalable Video Communication Server using selective multiplexing; and a Compositing Scalable Video Communication Server using selective multiplexing and bitstream-level compositing.