This document discusses the early history of video coding standardization. It covers the progress of video coding technologies from the 1950s to the 1980s and the standardization of H.261 in the late 1980s. It also compares the standardization processes of H.261 and H.265/HEVC and discusses some of the challenges in balancing standardization with allowing for evolving technologies.

1. EARLY DAYS OF VIDEO
CODING
STANDARDIZATION
10 October 2013
Sakae OKUBO
VTV Japan Inc.

2. 1. Progress of video coding technologies
2. History of video coding standardization
3. Guiding principles of the H.261 development
4. Reference Model methodology for consensus building
5. Comparison of H.261 and H.265/HEVC standardization
6. Merits and demerits of standardization
7. Challenge to the video coding standardization
Outline

3. 1. Progress of video coding technologies
DCT Discrete Cosine Transform
DPCM Differential PCM
MC Motion Compensation
PCM Pulse Code Modulation
Simple Interframe
Prediction
Transform
DCT
Vector
Quantization
VQ
Hybrid Coding
MC + DCT + VLC
MC + VQ + VLC
Motion Compensated
Interframe Prediction
ＭＣ
Block-based Coding
DPCM
PCM
Pel-based Coding
1950s
1960s
1970s
Early
1980s
Late1980s
and
beyond
Huffman Code
Variable Length Coding (VLC)
Arithmetic Code

4. 2. History of video coding
standardization
AVC: Advanced Video Coding
HEVC: High Efficiency Video Coding
MVC: Multiview Video Coding
SVC: Scalable Video Coding
• Year indicates when the first
version was issued
• Blue indicates common or twin
text standard between ITU-T and
ISO/IEC
• Yellow mark indicates the
presenter's involvement

5. 3. Guiding principles of the Specialists Group to
develop H.261
• The Specialists Group should collaborate as closely as
possible in defining a worldwide standard for 'second
generation' codecs.
• The best way to achieve this is eventually by conducting
a 'hardware' related project involving international
transmission tests.
• The aim will be to jointly formulate a specification by
means of largely independent but parallel hardware
experiments in participating countries.
• The Group will aim to avoid competition on standards,
but at a later date competition on codec manufacture
can be encouraged.
As recorded in the report of the first meeting in December 1984

6. 4. Reference Model methodology
for consensus building
Original model RM1
Next model RM2
Proposal 1 to
add a new
element
Proposal 2
to improve
an existing
element
Merit of a proposal is
demonstrated against
the original model.

7. Reference Models in various standardization
HEVC: High Efficiency Video Coding

8. 5. Comparison of H.261 and H.265/HEVC
standardization
Observations
- H.265/HEVC required 10 times human efforts than H.261.
- Starting early makes the work easy.

9. 6. Merits and demerits of standardization
+ A product from any company can be connected to the
network or interwork with another product.
+ Low cost can be expected with mass production
according to the standard.
+ “Non-tariff barrier” can be avoided by use of the
standard.
- Technology is fixed at the time of standardization.
Example of digital TV broadcasting: Terrestrial digital
broadcasting adopted MPEG-2 video coding in Japan.
Currently 4 times higher efficiency H.265/HEVC video
coding is available, but the replacement is impossible.

10. 7. Challenge to the video coding standardization
Some (partial) solutions:
- Specifying only the decoder to allow freedom of
the encoder design
- Use of negotiation if a bidirectional control
channel is available
- Software replacement in case of software codec
How can we enjoy new evolving technologies by
achieving standardization and backward compatibility
at the same time?

11. Back up
‘B’ system
RX
‘A’ system
RX
‘A’ system
RX
‘B’ system
RX
‘A’/’B’
switchable
RX
Gateway
‘A’&’B’ system
TX
‘B’ system
TX
‘B’ system
TX
‘A’ system
TX
a) Simulcasting
b) Gateway
c) Switchable receiver
‘A’ system: Current generation
‘B’ system: New generation
TX: Transmitter
RX: Receiver
‘A’ system stream
‘B’ system stream
‘A’ system stream
‘B’ system stream
‘B’ system stream
‘A’ system stream
System evolution in one way communications