Patent ID: 8290289
Filing Date: 2012-10-16
Classification: H04N

Abstract:
1. An image encoding method of encoding multi-viewpoint images obtained by a plurality of cameras while performing inter-camera image prediction by using an already-encoded reference image and a distance image from one of the cameras which was used for obtaining the reference image to an imaged object, the method comprising: using an electronic computing device to perform: a parallax vector determination step of: determining, on each target image for encoding, a corresponding point which corresponds to a pixel on a reference image, based on the distance provided to the pixel on the reference image, and a positional relationship between the camera used for obtaining the reference image and the camera used for obtaining each target image; and computing a parallax vector from the position of the pixel on the reference image to the corresponding point on said each target image in a pixel space; a target predictive vector determination step of computing a target predictive vector having the same starting point as the parallax vector and components obtained by rounding off the components of the parallax vector to integers by omitting the decimal part of each component of the parallax vector or selecting an integer closest to the value of each component of the parallax vector; a target reference vector determination step of computing a target reference vector having the same starting point as the parallax vector and the same size and direction as a differential vector between the target predictive vector and the parallax vector; and an inter-camera image prediction step of performing the inter-camera image prediction by setting a predicted value of a pixel on the target image, which is indicated by the target predictive vector, to a pixel value at an integer or decimal pixel position on the reference image, which is indicated by the target reference vector.