Patent ID: 6463164
Filing Date: 2002-10-08
Classification: G06T

Abstract:
A method for estimating motion vectors between a current frame and a reference frame wherein the current frame is divided into a plurality of search blocks and the reference frame is defined to include a plurality of search regions defined by search blocks of the plurality of search blocks, each of the plural search regions having a plurality of candidate blocks, comprising the steps of:(a) calculating horizontal and vertical features of a reference frame based on pixel data of the reference frame; (b) storing the calculated horizontal and vertical features; (c) computing horizontal and vertical features of a kth search block of the plurality of search blocks; (d) comparing the horizontal and vertical features of the kth search block with those of each of the plurality of candidate blocks of the reference frame in a search region using an error measure; (e) selecting a candidate block which yields a minimal error measure; and (f) computing a motion vector for the kth search block based on the selected candidate block; wherein in step (a) the horizontal and vertical features of a reference frame are calculated as follows: H^n-1&af;(i,j)=&Sum;p=jj+W-1&it;F^n-1&af;(i,p)V^n-1&af;(i,j)=&Sum;p=ii+Y-1&it;F^n-1&af;(p,j)where &Hcirc;nâˆ’1(i, j) denotes the horizontal features at pixel location (i,j), {circumflex over (V)}nâˆ’1(i, j) denotes the vertical features at pixel location (i,j), {circumflex over (F)}nâˆ’1(i, j) denotes pixel intensity values at pixel location (i,j) of the reference frame, and W and Y are the horizontal and vertical ranges of pixels selected for summation.