Layered Coding for a Scalable Video Delivery System

This paper presents a color-resolution layered coding scheme for a scalable video delivery system which operates over heterogeneous networks and distributes real-time streaming video to diverse types of video clients running on devices which range from high-powered workstations to mobile computing devices such as handheld and palm-sized computers. The layered coding scheme employs a wavelet transform-based technique to generate a scalable bit stream that is further separated into layers based on the colour and resolution information. These layers are then delivered over different multicast channels to video clients which selectively receives the layered streams and decodes the video according to their own bandwidth availability, processing power and display size. The layered coding scheme has been implemented in the scalable video delivery system on both the personal computer (PC) and digital signal processing (DSP) card platforms. Various issues related to the design, implementation and performance of this layered coding scheme on these platforms will be discussed in this paper.