MPEG-4 Technology Strategy Analysis Sonja Kangas, Mihai Burlacu T Research Seminar on Telecommunications Business II Telecommunications Software and Multimedia Laboratory Helsinki University of Technology

Organisations Behind MPEG 4 MPEG (Moving Picture Experts Group) 3GPP (The 3rd Generation Partnership Project) Internet Streaming Media Alliance (ISMA) M4IF´s (MPEG-4 Industry Forum) Wireless Multimedia Forum's (WMF) + others

Backwards compatible with older MPEG1 and MPEG2 Object Oriented Logic support Deals with "media objects" ->generalization for the visual and audio content to handle both natural and synthetic objects Coding/decoding of the media content must not be related to any transmission medium MPEG1 released in standard for storable multimedia, mostly for CD-ROM systems. MPEG- 1designed for compressing video, but sound compressing format (MP3) format became more popular. The typical transfer speed of MPEG-1 is VHS quality video (1,5 Mb/s). MPEG2 released in Meant for Digital TV. Used to DVD and satelite digital broadcast. Typical rates range from 1.5 Mb/s up to 24 Mb/s MPEG4 released in Targeted for IP networks streaming applications. Very wide bitrate ranges from few kb/s to tens of Mb/s

Transmission/Storage Medium Transmission/Storage Medium independent of MPEG-4 spec. It specifies the physical layer, digital storage requirements a.so.("raw data" Upper network layer (like UDP/IP, ATM, MPEG2 Transport Stream) to handle the actual physical network properties Delivery Layer Media object conveyed by multiple elementary streams. Content of the streams: audio-visual object data, scene description information, control information in the form of object descriptors The sync layer passes the elementary streams to delivery layer through the DMIF- application interface (DAI); Defined a single, uniform interface to access multimedia from a multitude of delivery technologies ((DAI) used for bringing broadcast material and local files) The DAI defines procedures for initializing an MPEG-4 session and obtaining access to the various elementary streams that are contained in it. Similar to ftp protocol FlexMux is an optional tool Quality of Service available to content provider. (DAI allows the user application to specify it for the necessary streams

Sync Layer Synch Layer handles the synchronization of elementary streams and also provides the buffering. It is achieved through time stamping within elementary streams. Synchronization Layer does not contain information for frame demarcation Multimedia Layer Converts the multimedia elements into elementary streams. Difference between synthetic objects and natural objects visible at this stage Object descriptors : identify information type from elem streams and identify the group of streams related to a media object Media object carried in own elementary streams. The scene description information defines the spatial and temporal position of the media objects, their behavior over time Scene composition described with a binary language for scene description called BIFS (Binary format for scenes). Describes an efficient binary representation of the scene graph. Similar to VRML. Difference: VRML textual, BIFS binary. BIFS defined for streaming mainly. Scene sending: send initial img followed by timestamp modifications to the scene Upper elements make interactive applications easy to be implemented.

Dynamic Image Coding

Static Texture Coding - done with Discrete Wavelet Transform Usage of reversible variable length codes. AUDIO "General Audio (GA)" coders. Input signal is first decomposed into a time/frequency (t/f) spectral representation by means of an analysis filterbank, which is then subsequently quantized and coded. Bitrate scalability important feature Synthetic sound support + old traditional sound compressions tool available

Business strategies: MPEG-4 next big thing? Expectations (industry viewpoint): Video to be MPEG-4’s main application area Industry people both servers and consumers of MPEG-4 MPEG-4 deployment started in 2002 Eencoder/server/player solution seems to be good idea Software encoders vs. hardware encoders Priority: performance, availability and price Wireless video does not lead the growth of MPEG-4 Expectations (consumers): What MPEG-4?

Video on mobile devices 1. The growth of data bandwidth in mobile networks 2. Improved video compression technologies 3. Improved camera and display technologies Video applications in wireless devices - video conference/telephony, MMS, video messanging, video streaming (advertisement, entertainment, education, communication...) + Media integration (multiple media): Interactive eLearning, interactive advertising, network games, media-on demand, MP3, HDTV, digital cable TV, personal video recording (PVR) etc.

An example: The mobile entertainment value web (possibilities for MPEG-4)

Areas of application Wide: digital television, multimedia, video, audio, wireless... Key issues - new ways of using and accessing media - streaming and downloading video - interoperability - secure communication and pay-per-view - "mixing the best of Shockwave, Flash, VRML, and digital video into a single file format, server and player"

New business opportunities - business opportunities for established market players and newcomers to digital video and multimedia - MPEG-4 devices for home entertainment systems (set-top-boxes, DVD players, handheld devices...), wireless, other - Rich (multi)media across broadcast, broadband, wireless and wired networks - New ways of experiencing media! (compare to the content industry trends) - Different categories of excellence (web): hw/sw, real time/non-real time -- read by the same decoders

Problems in the paradise... + Apple: Internet Streaming Media Alliance and other consortiums for and against + MPEG-4 is very extensive standard -- much more than Real and Microsoft - The static nature of the standard is its weakness - Future development of MPEG-4 or another standard? - Competing video codecs: QuickTime, Real, Windows Media - IPR issues - patents and discoveries behing MPEG-4 (problems?)

Thank you!