Heterogeneous multiprocessor for high definition video

This work presents the heterogeneous multiprocessor capable of processing HDTV material (1920*1080i at 60 Hz) in the domain of motion estimation based TV applications. In particular, it is targeted to the state-of-the-art format conversion and scan-rate conversion functions like de-interlacing and picture-rate up-conversion. The heterogeneous multiprocessor consists of five processors communicating through fifos and shared memories. The highest picture quality level that meets the HDTV real-time performance was enabled by: judicious choice of application task partitioning; right choice of instruction set architecture for the VLIW-based multiprocessor; exploitation of the customized two level memory hierarchy (the search area scratchpad and the region scratchpad). Furthermore, the heterogeneous multiprocessor offers high degree of flexibility: size and aspect ratio of the region and the search area scratchpads; algorithm for selection of the motion vector candidates; algorithm for post-processing of the motion vector field; plethora of interpolation schemes used in motion estimation and compensation offering trade-off between interpolation complexity and number of interpolated pixels in parallel.