Asymmetric diamond search pattern for motion estimation in HEVC

Abstract

The computational complexity of H.265 is extremely high since it uses a lot of block size for motion estimation (ME). In order to reduce it, square pattern and diamond pattern are recommended in the H.265 reference software. In this paper, the new asymmetric diamond search patterns are proposed to reduce even further the calculation load of the ME. The new patterns reduce the computation load of ME an impressive amount of nearly 69.5% and 72%, respectively, comparing to the recommended search pattern of square pattern. Similar, the encoding time reduces 65% and 69%. The bit rate and PSNR are virtually unchanged.