Interactive optimization and massively parallel implementations of video compression algorithms

This paper presents a new technique which allows interactive optimization of video compression algorithms using massively parallel computers such as the CRAY T3D. This work aims to exploit as much as possible the parallel nature of digital image processing algorithms to obtain almost real-time computing with the flexibility of a software implementation. Thanks to this low computation time, interactive tools have been developed which allow easy and fast visual evaluation of image quality. This leads to significant productivity gain when developing new video compression techniques. Our approach has been validated on advanced region-based video compression algorithms. The interactive facilities offered by the proposed technique permit the accurate optimization of the algorithm parameters in few minutes, where several days were previously needed. Depending on the complexity of the compression algorithms, 8-12 images are compressed, decompressed and visualized per second