Error concealment for slice group based multiple description video coding

This paper develops error concealment methods for multiple description video coding (MDC) in order to adapt to error prone packet networks. The three-loop slice group MDC approach of D. Wang et al. (2005) is used. MDC is very suitable for multiple channel environments, and especially able to maintain acceptable quality when some of these channels fail completely, i.e. in an on-off MDC environment, without experiencing any drifting problem. Our MDC scheme coupled with the proposed concealment approaches proved to be suitable not only for the on-off MDC environment case (data from one channel fully lost), but also for the case where only some packets are lost from one or both channels. Copying video and using motion vectors from correct descriptions are combined together for concealment prior to applying traditional methods. Results are compared to the traditional error concealment method proposed in the H.264 reference software, showing significant improvements for both the balanced and unbalanced channel cases.