Can H.265 Push Security Surveillance into a New Realm of High Definition?

Since the middle of last year, the news about the upcoming release of the new video coding standard H.265 has attracted widespread attention from the industry in China. Since 2013, there have been more and more arguments and speculations about H.265. What is the difference between the H.265 video coding standard and the old standard? Its launch will have an impact on the development of our security industry. How do the industry stakeholders see this new standard?

Generation of H.265 In January 2010, ITU-TVCEG (Video Coding Experts Group) and ISO/IEC MPEG (Moving Picture Experts Group) jointly established JCT-VC (Joint Collaborative Teamon Video Coding) to jointly organize the next-generation coding standard: HEVC (High Efficiency Video Coding). On June 25th, 2012, the International Telecommunications Union (hereinafter referred to as ITU) announced the work plan project on its official website. The "High efficiency video coding" (HEVC also called H.265) technical standard originally scheduled for 2008 to 2010 was introduced. It is expected to be launched in January 2013.

H.265 is the new video coding standard developed by ITU-TVCEG following H.264. The H.265 standard revolves around the existing video coding standard H.264, retaining some of the original technologies and improving some related technologies. The new technology uses advanced techniques to improve the relationship between codestream, encoding quality, latency, and algorithm complexity to achieve optimal settings. The specific research contents include: improving compression efficiency, improving robustness and error recovery capability, reducing real-time delay, reducing channel acquisition time and random access delay, and reducing complexity. H.264 can achieve standard-definition digital image transmission at speeds lower than 1 Mbps due to algorithm optimization; H.265 can implement 720P (resolution 1280*720) ordinary high-definition audio and video transmission using 1 to 2 Mbps transmission speed.

Technical advantages of H.265 As a next-generation video coding standard, H.265 (HEVC) still belongs to a predictive-plus-transformation hybrid coding framework. However, compared to H.264, H.265 has revolutionized many aspects. The main technical advantages of H.265 (HEVC) are: flexible coding structure; flexible block structure; sampling point adaptive offset; adaptive loop filtering;

H.265 still belongs to the mixed coding framework of prediction-plus-transform, however it adopts a more flexible coding structure to improve the coding efficiency, including CodingUnit, PredictUnit and TransformUnit. The coding unit is similar to the concept of macroblock in H.264/AVC. The prediction unit is the basic unit for prediction, and the transformation unit is the basic unit for transform and quantization. Under this hybrid coding framework, HEVC carries out a large number of technological innovations, such as segmentation structure and residual coding structure based on large-sized quadtree blocks, multi-angle intra prediction technology, motion estimation fusion technology and semantic-based entropy coding technology . The current chip architecture has evolved from single-core to homogeneous multi-core. In order to adapt to a chip with a very high degree of parallelism, H.265 introduces many optimization ideas for parallel operations.

H.265's Application Advantages The application of high-definition video in security monitoring has become more and more popular, resulting in a dramatic increase in storage costs and space. Compared with the H.264 encoding technology in use, H.265's high compression rate feature can save about half of the storage space, thereby significantly reducing the video storage costs.

With the development of science and technology, people increasingly hope that any desired content and service can be more conveniently accessed through any terminal anywhere, anytime. LTE and other 4G wireless technologies support much higher capacity at a lower cost per bit, thereby improving the commercial viability of video services. It is expected that in the next few years, the bandwidth of video content will be required to be further reduced, and operators will have the necessary solution and network flexibility to provide users with a truly mobile video and multimedia experience in a cost-effective manner. In addition, the mobile terminal's display technology is moving in the direction of ultra-high ppi and ultra-high resolution. Therefore, the high compression rate characteristic of H.265 will further promote the popularization of high-definition and ultra-high-definition video transmission in 4G networks.

Multi-core processors are gradually replacing traditional single-processors to become mainstream in the market due to their high performance and low power consumption. With the expansion of application requirements and technological advances, multi-core will show its more powerful performance advantages. H.265 video coding technology takes parallel implementation into account when designing. The newly added Tile partitioning mechanism makes the previous coarse-grained data parallelism unit of slices, frames, or GOPs more suitable for parallel implementation on homogeneous multi-core processors. The Dependentslice and WPP mechanisms solve the problem that the entropy coding links in H.264 and other coding technologies cannot be implemented in parallel, making the division of task modules such as DCT, motion estimation, motion compensation, and entropy coding more uniform and significantly improved in the entire coding and decoding process. Parallel speedup.

In short, H.265 will greatly promote the rapid development of video applications including high-definition video.

The promotion of H.265 still has resistance The upcoming news of the H.265 standard has triggered many hot debates in the industry. After the introduction of this new standard can bring much change to the security industry, no one can give a conclusion, but this is also a question that we are thinking about. Nowadays, the trend of high-definition, intelligent, and IT development in the security industry has become inevitable, and whether it can provide higher coding technology is a decisive factor that directly affects the development of HD.

Some people in the industry stated that whether the H.265 standard can become the new mainstream compression standard depends on the chip manufacturer. Because video processing chip manufacturers have embedded what kind of compression technology, downstream manufacturers can only passively accept the purchase of chips. So in fact, security companies are passive recipients of the H.265 standard. However, although upstream chip makers are the direct motivators for which standards they choose, what kind of compression standards are used is whether the standards themselves are superior.

There is also a view that the dominant security market is a price factor in the technical market structure. The price of the product will directly affect the market acceptance, and will also affect the company's cost accounting. Who will become the mainstream of the compression standard depends on the influence of various factors, including the market, policies, and so on. So for video coding standards, who will become the mainstream of MPEG4, SVAC, AVS, H.264, H.265? The market is the final tester.

In addition, the new H.265 may adopt a payment method, which has also led to a hot debate in the industry. Although the standard payment problem in the field of video surveillance has not yet been fully covered. But whether or not users will be charged in the future is a thought-provoking issue. As one industry insider points out, when an industry is in a weak situation, the patent issue is in an insignificant position. Patent owners may not value this patent fee. However, once the industry grows, the huge patent fees will It will prompt the patent owner to exercise this right.

Finally there is a security issue that cannot be ignored. If the international compression standard is adopted, once the video coding is deciphered, the loss will be difficult to make up for, so domestic SVAC standards of independent intellectual property rights have been pushing.

Zhu Jiaqing, deputy chief engineer of Guangdong XTONG Technology Co., Ltd., expressed an optimistic and positive attitude towards the arrival of H.265. “H.265 can achieve 1080P full-HD audio and video transmission at a transmission speed of less than 1Mbps, saving network resources and Storage space has great benefits. Therefore, as a company that has always focused on network video surveillance, we actively respond to new standards and actively develop new standards of products and technologies." Regarding the impact of H.265 on China's security industry, Zhu Jiaqing said that in the face of the introduction and promotion of new video coding standards, domestic first- and second-rate manufacturers will soon adapt to new standards, and develop and produce corresponding products to adapt. Market demand, and some third- and fourth-stream manufacturers will be eliminated.

Postscript:

For a long time, coding standards were a focus of the monitoring industry. Although the H.265 standard has been greatly improved in terms of compression efficiency, parallel processing capability, and network adaptability, its development and application will certainly provide the current security monitoring industry with more choices and greater room for development. However, in the face of new standards, we cannot passively accept it. Only in-depth analysis of industry and user needs, understanding the direction of technological development and market dynamics, and strengthening investment in core technology research and development, and actively participating in the formulation of relevant technical standards, can we change the standard The passive bearer is the standard setter. Only in this way can domestic security companies master the initiative in standard setting and make necessary preparations for entering the international high-end market.

At the same time, for security companies, in the face of new video coding standards, we must do a comprehensive risk assessment before developing new products, including technology, economy and market. The new product is best able to be compatible with the old product so that it can develop new applications more smoothly.