Patent ID: 8126060

Claim:
A motion vector detection device to detect a motion vector for generating a predicted image used for inter-frame prediction coding of an interlaced image, comprising: a first motion vector detection circuit configured to detect, with accuracy of one pixel unit or more, a motion vector between a top field of an encoding target image and a top field of a reference image, a motion vector between the top field of the encoding target image and a bottom field of the reference image, a motion vector between a bottom field of the encoding target image and the top field of the reference image, and a motion vector between the bottom field of the encoding target image and the bottom field of the reference image, respectively as first motion vectors; a first motion vector extraction circuit configured to extract a preset reduced number of first motion vectors from the plurality of first motion vectors detected by the first motion vector detection circuit; a selection circuit configured to select the first motion vectors from the plurality of first motion vectors detected by the first motion vector detection circuit, or the first motion vectors extracted by the first motion vector extraction circuit; and a second motion vector detection circuit configured to further detect motion vectors with accuracy of less than one pixel unit as second motion vectors based on the first motion vectors selected by the selection circuit.