Patent Document ID: 20020118752
Application ID: 10024215
Patent Flag: 0

Claim One:
1. A moving picture encoding system for encoding moving picture sequences with respect to each object, comprising: a coding means for encoding object picture data consisting of time series sequences of video object planes (VOPs), each of which is a picture image of the object at a point of time, and shape information data indicating the shape of the object in each VOP while conducting bit rate control so that the number of generated bits for each VOP meets a target bit number, and outputting coding information including a quantization parameter used in encoding and the generated bit number along with obtained bit streams; an area calculating means for calculating the area of the object in each VOP based on the shape information data, and outputting the result as area data; a predictive area calculating parameter extracting means for obtaining a function that indicates temporal variations in the area of the object based on the history of the area data, and outputting a parameter specifying the function or a predictive value of the area obtained by the function as a predictive area calculating parameter; a bit number model parameter calculating means for calculating a parameter used in modeling the generated bit number per unit area of the object based on the coding information, the generated bit number and the area data, and outputting the result as a bit number model parameter; a predictive bit number calculating parameter extracting means for obtaining a function that indicates temporal variations in the bit number model parameter based on the history of the bit number model parameter, and outputting a parameter specifying the function or a predictive value of the bit number model parameter obtained by the function as a predictive bit number calculating parameter; and a target bit number calculating means which performs a series of processes: calculating an uncoded VOP allocatable bit number that is the total number of allocatable bits for uncoded VOPs in a certain period of time based on allocatable bit number information indicating the total number of allocatable bits for the VOPs in the certain period of time and the number of generated bits for the encoded VOPs in the certain period of time, estimating the number of generated bits for the uncoded VOPs based on the predictive area calculating parameter and the predictive bit number calculating parameter, allocating the uncoded VOP allocatable bit number, calculating a target bit number for the next VOP to be encoded, and outputting the target bit number; sequentially for each of VOPs in the certain period of time.