3D Video Processing and Transmission Fundamentals

Abstract

3D video provides the sensation of depth by adding the depth dimension to conventional 2D imagery and video. this allows our human visual system (HVS) to perceive depth as we do in normal vision, which fuses two slightly different views of the same scene in the brain. at present, 3D video applications are not only limited to flight simulators and IMAX theatres, but also available in mobile phones (e.g. LG Optimus), tablets (e.g. GADMEI 3D tablet), television (almost all makes), and advertising boards.Currently, most of the 3D content is user generated and 2D to 3D conversions while percentage of service provider generated content is reducing. This added dimension of depth in 3D imagery and video comes at a cost. Unlike 2D video, the 3D video contents are bulky in natureand often require a larger storage, memory, processing power and bandwidth for communication applications. For instance, the stereoscopic video which is regarded as one of the simplest forms of 3D video, requires twice the space of 2D video since binocular/stereo video content consists of two video streams generated for left and right eyes. This is a major challenge when it comes to delivering 3D video over band-limited channels such as wireless channels. Therefore, it is necessary to have efficient compression and transmission methods to enable 3D video over already established infrastructures for 2D video storage and transmission. This text book presents the methodologies which could be adapted to compress 3D video. Furthermore, this elaborates on effective transmission approaches for 3D video. Perceptual aspects of 3D technologies also recently received much attention due to the complex nature of 3D perception. Therefore, this book alo elaborates on quality evaluation of 3D video. The latest reserach efforts are also briefly presented to provide a glance of where the technology is heading.