Video-Encoding-on-a-GPU-Explained-in-Detail
13 Jun
Fundamentals

Video Encoding on a GPU – Explained in Detail

In this article, we talk about video encoding on GPUs, why GPUs are suited for video compression, and compare it with CPU-based video compression.  Video can be compressed using software or hardware video compression solutions/systems. Hardware encoders are machines dedicated for video compression (using FPGA, ASIC, etc.) and software encoders are software products that run on the machine’s CPUs/GPUs.  A lot of video compression is done on CPUs, because of their versatility, complex instruction sets, and frankly, their vast availability. However, as video resolutions and bitrates increase, the limitations of CPUs for encoding video become apparent. And, these limitations can be seen...

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10 Jun
Glossary

What is HDR (High Dynamic Range)

High Dynamic Range, or HDR, is a technology used to improve image and video quality. It functions by boosting the contrastᅳsharpening the appearance of objects, so the light and dark parts of the viewed world stand out with more clarityᅳin image and video. HDR can work with a wide brightness and color output in a manner that delivers a really good viewing experience. What you usually see as a highlight of a viewed object or scene when you view SDR (or Standard Dynamic Range) images or video will look like a supernova when you view the same under the HDR condition. SDR...

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06 Jun
Glossary

What is CBR or Constant Bitrate in Video Compression?

Constant Bit Rate (CBR) rate control is used to ensure that compressed videos (or video streams) occupy a certain number of bits per second when they are played back. A fundamental part of any video compression system is in the control of the bit rateᅳhow the available data gets distributed across the video frames. A simple and predictable way of doing this is to allocate the same number of bits per elapsed unit of time (e.g., seconds) for each video and this is how CBR works. In other words, no matter how intricate the scenes being encoded are, or how simple and...

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04 Jun
Glossary

What are P-Frames and how are they used?

P-frames, which stand for "predicted frames," have always existed in the middle space between I-frames, or "complete images," and B-frames, or "highly compressed bi-directional predicted frames" - and they provide a good middle-ground in terms of file size reduction and video quality. Learn more about I-frames (and IDRs) and B-frames here. They plays a critical role in video compression in video codecs like H.264/AVC, HEVC, and AV1 and let us see why.The compression power of P-frames mostly comes from their use of motion estimation. If we have a video sequence with slow and gradual movementᅳsay, a person talking with minimally changing surroundings...

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03 Jun
Glossary

What are I-Frames (IDRs) and how are they used?

I-frames (intra-coded frame) play a very important role in video compression and in this article, we shall see why exactly. Unlike the P-frame (predictive-coded frame), which codes only the differences from the previous frame, and the B-frame (bi-predictively coded frame), which codes the differences from both the previous and following frames, the I-frame itself is coded as if it were an individual complete image. Read more about B-frames and P-frames that we wrote earlier. The I-frame doesn't refer to other frames for information, and because of this feature, it plays a critical role in video compression. They are found in video codecs like...

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31 May
Glossary

What are B-Frames and how are they used?

B-frames are a unique type of frame used in video codecs. They are found in video compression formats like H.264/AVC, HEVC, and AV1. You can think of them as helping to define the intermediate state of frames in a sequence. They contribute a lot to reducing the size of video files. However, if they do their job poorly, they can reintroduce visual artifacts, leading to a subpar experience for the viewer. So, their correct implementation is of the utmost importance.B-frames make use of information from both the previous and next frames in the Group of Pictures (GOP) to achieve highly...

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30 May
Glossary

What is WebP Image Compression?

The WebP image format, developed by Google, can offer better compression and quality for images on web pages compared with other current image formats. WebP is another image format similar to AVIF and JPEG-LI. It is designed to enable small size files while maintaining the image quality, so that it is suitable for loading a web page faster and providing economical image storage. Both these are very important for image heavy websites like Pinterest, or e-commerce websites like Amazon, Shopify, eBay, Etsy, etc. WebP supports both lossy and lossless compression. In the lossless mode, the compressed image contains all the original data,...

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28 May
Glossary

What is VBR or Variable Bitrate in Video Compression?

While compressing a video, one needs to do a lot of work and tuning to achieve a balance between video quality and file size. One of the important parameters in the video compression process is "rate control" and this specifies how the video is compressed and how the "bit budget" is distributed across a video. One of the rate control techniques is VBR (Variable Bitrate) rate control that offers a nice trade-off between quality and bitrate (filesize) for a video. A very common form of rate control is CBR (Constant Bitrate) encoding. It divides the video file into a number of segments...

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28 May
Glossary

What is JPEG-LI?

For years, the JPEG (Joint Photographic Experts Group) format has been the standard for digital image storage and sharing. But JPEG's method of compression often forces a choice between image quality and file size. However, there is a new image coding format called JPEG-LI that could change the way we store and send visual information. JPEG-LI is a coding library created by Google that aims to improve the traditional JPEG compression by a large margin. Maintaining compatibility with existing JPEG viewers and programs, JPEG-LI provides compression that halves the size of the JPEG guise while retaining image quality.There are a few...

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21 May
Glossary

What is Stereoscopic Video?

Stereoscopic video, also called 3D video, brings viewers into a world beyond the flat screen. Instead of presenting an image moving on a flat screen (like a normal 32" or "43" inch TV would), stereoscopic video creates depth and we humans experience this depth through depth perception in our natural vision. By presenting slightly different video feeds to each eye, stereoscopic video re-creates the 3-D perception on a flat screen, and gives us very realistic three dimensional images that can be viewed without any special eyeglasses!Depth perception comes naturally for humans and its one of the prime reasons that we've survived and...

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