Patent ID: 7966642

Claim:
A method comprising the steps of: receiving plural video streams corresponding to a first format and a second format different than the first format; encoding in parallel plural digitized pictures of a first picture sequence corresponding to a first video stream of the plural received video streams and a second picture sequence corresponding to a second video stream of the plural received video streams to produce a transport stream comprising a multiplex of a corresponding first compressed video stream and a second compressed video stream, respectively, the first and second video streams having the first format and the first and second compressed video streams having the second format; storing the transport stream in a storage device; determining whether the encoded pictures of the first and second compressed video streams are to be transcoded according to a first operating mode or a second operating mode relative to producing the video stream, the determination based on availability of processing resources, wherein the first operating mode is implemented in non-real time and the second operating mode is implemented in real-time; and transcoding at least a portion of the first compressed video stream or the second compressed video stream according to either the first operating mode or the second operating mode responsive to a determination regarding the sufficiency of processing resources.