A novel motion estimation algorithm using phase plane correlation for frame rate conversion

Frame rate conversion is an important application in video processing. It allows the application to perform processes such as slow motion, standard conversion and display conversion. The ability to perform high quality interpolation would improve the quality of all these processes. The requirement for accurate motion vectors is extremely important for the interpolator. The phase plane correlation approach achieves this with far less operation count than different block matching algorithms. Two approaches have been discussed to find accurate motion vectors as well as the application in interpolation of intermediate frames. In the first approach, hierarchical block matching (HBM) with smoothness constraint is used to find robust motion vectors for interpolation of spatio-temporal filters. In the second approach, the motion vector from phase plane correlation (PPC) method is used that assigns multiple motion vectors to a block thus achieving the result of object based approaches with much fewer operation counts.