Fast intra mode decision for HEVC based on direction energy distribution

JCT-VC joined by ITU-T VCEG and ISO/IEC MPEG is developing a new video coding standard called HEVC to achieve better coding efficiency for the emerging HD or Ultra HD video content. One of the new coding features in HEVC is increasing intra prediction modes from 9 in H.264/AVC to 35. To reduce the computation time, this paper presents a fast intra mode decision algorithm based on direction energy distribution. The saving of computation time for the first rough mode decision can be up to 68% under the negligible PSNR drop and bit rate increase.