Patent ID: 7408990

Claim:
A method comprising: selecting a variable length code table from among plural variable length code tables available in an encoder, wherein each of the plural available variable length code tables has a different set of plural variable length codes used for encoding and decoding motion vector differential information; computing a motion vector predictor for a motion vector, wherein the motion vector predictor includes a horizontal motion vector predictor component and a vertical motion vector predictor component, and wherein the motion vector includes a horizontal motion vector component and a vertical motion vector component; computing a horizontal motion vector differential component based at least in part upon difference between the horizontal motion vector component and the horizontal motion vector predictor component; computing a vertical motion vector differential component based at least in part upon difference between the vertical motion vector component and the vertical motion vector predictor component; and using the selected variable length code table, producing a first variable length code from the set of plural variable length codes of the selected variable length code table, wherein the first variable length code jointly represents information used for decoding the horizontal motion vector differential component and for decoding the vertical motion vector differential component.