Variable-complexity algorithms provide a means of managing the computational complexity of a software video CODEC. The reduction in computational complexity provided by existing variable-complexity algorithms depends on the video scene characteristics and is difficult to predict. A new approach to variablecomplexity encoding is proposed in this paper. A variablecomplexity DCT algorithm is adaptively updated in order to maintain a near-constant computational complexity. The adaptive update algorithm is shown to be capable of providing a significant, predictable reduction in computational complexity with only a small loss of video quality. The proposed approach may be particularly useful for software-only video encoding.
Iain E. Garden Richardson, Yafan Zhao