Patent ID: 8160141

Claim:
A system for selecting an intra mode in a video image encoder, comprising: a computer processor; and programming executable on said computer processor for: (a) selecting a lowest Sum of Absolute Transformed Differences (SATD) intra mode among intra modes using inputs [x], H pos , V pos , h(bar), and v(bar); (b) wherein [x] is a 4×4 block of pixels within a picture and [ x ] ≡ [ x 0 , 0 x 0 , 1 x 0 , 2 x 0 , 3 x 1 , 0 x 1 , 1 x 1 , 2 x 1 , 3 x 2 , 0 x 2 , 1 x 2 , 2 x 2 , 3 x 3 , 0 x 3 , 1 x 3 , 2 x 3 , 3 ] (c) wherein H pos is a horizontal pixel position of the 4×4 lock within the image; (d) wherein V pos is a vertical pixel position of the 4×4 block within the image; (e) wherein {right arrow over (h)} is a horizontal vector immediately left of the 4×4 block [x], defined as {right arrow over (h)}≡(x 0,−1 , x 1,−1 , x 2,−1 , x 3,−1 ,) T relative to the indexing of the elements of [x]; (f) wherein {right arrow over (v)} is a horizontal vector immediately above the 4×4 block [x], defined as {right arrow over (v)}≡(x −1,0 , x −1,1 , x −1,2 , x −1,3 ) T relative to the indexing of the elements of [x];and (g) wherein the lowest SATD intra mode is determined among a group comprising: i. a horizontal intra mode; ii. a vertical intra mode; and iii. a steady state (DC) intra mode; and (h) outputting the lowest SATD intra mode to a non-transitory computer readable medium.