Fast predictive integer- and half-pel motion search for interlaced video coding

A fast algorithm to perform integer- and half-pel motion search for interlaced video is proposed in this work. By exploiting the correlation between the frame- and the field-type integer-pel search, the proposed scheme can skip the sub-optimal integer-pel search type. Furthermore, based on the matching cost obtained from integer-pel search, the scheme will determine whether to perform the half-pel search. If the half-pel search is deemed necessary, the scheme is able to skip sub-optimal half-pel search points to further reduce the computational cost. Compared with the baseline scheme of the MVFAST algorithm for interlaced video, our new scheme can reduce up to 70% search points with around 0.1 ∼ 0.2 db quality degradation.