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AVC-Intra is a type of video coding developed by Panasonic, and then supported in products made by other companies. AVC-Intra is available in Panasonic's high definition broadcast products, such as, for example, their P2 card equipped broadcast cameras. [1] [2]

Technical details

In April 2007, Panasonic announced AVC-Intra codec support. The use of AVC-Intra provides production quality HD video at bit rates more normally associated with electronic news gathering applications, permitting full resolution, 10-bit field capture of high quality HD imagery in one piece camera-recorders.

AVC-Intra is compliant with the H.264/MPEG-4 AVC standard [2] and Panasonic claims to follow the SMPTE RP 2027–2007 [3] recommended practice specification. [4] Analysis by the x264 project has shown that Panasonic does not comply with this specification [5]

AVC-Intra was intended for video professionals who have to store HD digital video for editing and archiving. It defines 10-bit intra-frame only compression, which is easy for editing and preserves maximum video quality. The technology significantly outperforms the older HDV ( MPEG2 based) and DVCPRO HD ( DV based) formats, allowing the codec in certain conditions to maintain better quality in half the storage space of DVCPRO HD.[ citation needed]

AVC-Intra defines two classes:

  • AVC-Intra 50:
    • nominally 50 Mbit/s, size of each frame is fixed
    • CABAC entropy coding only.
    • 1920 × 1080 formats are High 10 Intra Profile, Level 4
    • 1280 × 720 formats are High 10 Intra Profile, Level 3.2
    • 4:2:0 chrominance sampling
    • frames are horizontally scaled by 3/4 (1920x1080 is scaled to 1440x1080. 1280 × 720 is scaled to 960x720)
  • AVC-Intra 100:
    • nominally 100 Mbit/s, size of each frame is fixed
    • CAVLC entropy coding only.
    • All formats are High 4:2:2 Intra Profile, Level 4.1
    • 4:2:2 chrominance sampling
    • frames are not scaled

Common to both classes;

  • Frame rates: 1920 × 1080 (23.98p / 25p / 29.97p / 50i / 59.94i), 1280 × 720 (23.98p / 25p / 29.97p / 50p / 59.94p)
  • 10 bit luma and chroma

Panasonic's implementation of AVC-Intra codec has following limitations: 8 × 8 transform only, 8 × 8 intra prediction only, 10 slices per picture, MBAFF for interlace material, custom quantization matrices for each class and each resolution. [6]

AVC-Ultra

The Panasonic AVC-Ultra family defines an additional three new encoding parameters within the MPEG-4 Part 10 standard, utilizing up to the 4:4:4 Intra Predictive Profile, as well as an additional low bitrate proxy recording mode.

The most efficient new parameter within AVC-Ultra is by Panasonic called, AVC-LongG. AVC-LongG enables compression of video resolutions up to 1920 × 1080 @ 23.97, 25 and 29.97p, with 10 bits of pixel depth at 4:2:2 color sampling, at data rates as low as 25 Mbit / sec. [7]

More over, the AVC-Intra Class 50/100 is now extended to Class 200 and Class 4:4:4. The Class 200 mode extends the bitrate to 226 Mbit / sec for 1080/23,97p, while the Class 4:4:4 extends the possible resolution from 720p to 4K with pixel depths at 10 and 12 bits.

The bitrate settings for Class 4:4:4 varies between 200 and 440 Mbit / sec depending on the resolution, frame rate and bit depth. Both the Class 200 and the Class 4:4:4 are Intra-only coding modes.

The AVC-Proxy mode enables extremely fast ENG content delivery and offline edits of 720p and 1080p video at bitrates varying between 800 Kbit to 3.5 Mbit / sec at 8 bits of pixel depth.

More recent information about AVC-Ultra (including the new 10-bit and 12-bit Class4:4:4, Class2K4:2:2, Class2K4:4:4, Class4K4:2:2, and Class4K4:4:4) is available on Panasonic's AVC-Ultra Page.

Third-party support

  • Avid's Media Composer since v 3.5.0 provides support via Avid Media Access (AMA), a new plug-in architecture [8]
  • Apple's Final Cut Pro 7 provides native AVC-Intra decoding within a ProRes 422 timeline. [ citation needed]
  • Apple's Final Cut Pro X provides native editing of AVC-Intra, including AVC-Intra 100 and AVC-Intra 50, as well as AVC-LongG, with support for import and playback without transcoding within a ProRes 422 timeline. [9]
  • MXF4mac offers an AVC-Intra codec for QuickTime that allows to export AVC-Intra and to set up native AVC-Intra timelines in Final Cut Pro. [10]
  • EVS Broadcast Equipment has announced AVC-Intra 100 support for their XT[2]+, XT[3] and XS server family [11]
  • MainConcept offer an AVC-Intra encoder and decoder as part of their Codec SDK [12]
  • Harris Corporation announced AVC-Intra support for the NEXIO AMP line of video servers at NAB 2008
  • Omneon announced AVC-Intra support for their Spectrum and MediaDeck products in 2007. [13]
  • Quantel demonstrated AVC-Intra workflow at NAB 2007, [14] and released to customers [15] in 2008 with their V4 software. [16]
  • Grass Valley has announced native support for AVC-Intra in Edius 4.5 [17]
  • Adobe's After Effects CS5 provides native AVC-Intra decoding. [18]
  • Vanguard Software Solutions provides an H.264/AVC PC SDK capable of encoding at 100 Mbit/s in real-time [19] [20]
  • FFmpeg and Libav support decoding of both forms of AVC-Intra [21]
  • ATEME AVC-I Contribution Encoders [22]
  • x264 can encode AVC-Intra [5]
  • Broadcast products based on SHINE Media Platform [23] of GammaRED Engineering

Several companies introduced AVC Intra codec semiconductor intellectual property cores. [24]

  • CoreEL Technologies ( http://www.coreel.com) provides AVC-Intra Class 50 and AVC-Intra Class 100 IP cores.
  • Tata Elxsi ( http://www.tataelxsi.com) provides AVC-Intra & AVC-Ultra fully optimizable class 50 and 100 IP.
  • Vanguard Software Solutions provides AVC-Intra 50 and 100 encoder IP (up to AVC-Ultra: 1080p60 at 300 Mbit/s).
  • Nethra Imaging provides AVC-Intra 50 and 100 encoder IP.

References

  1. ^ "AJ-HPX2000 brochure" (PDF). Retrieved 29 January 2008.
  2. ^ a b "AVC-Intra Frequently Asked Questions" (PDF). Panasonic. 20 September 2007. Retrieved 30 October 2013.
  3. ^ "SMPTE RP 2027–2007, "AVC Intra-Frame Coding Specification for SSM Card Applications"".
  4. ^ "AVC-Intra (H.264 Intra) Compression, Technical Overview" (PDF). Retrieved 29 January 2008.
  5. ^ a b "Git commit". x264 git. Archived from the original on 26 January 2016. Retrieved 9 January 2016.
  6. ^ "AVC-Intra Technical Overview by Panasonic Broadcast" (PDF) (in French). Archived from the original (PDF) on 20 July 2011.
  7. ^ Mullen, Stephen (October 2012). "Discover the benefits of AVC-Ultra". Tv Technology.
  8. ^ "Avid Announces Surge of Third-Party Integrations at NAB '09". Avid. Archived from the original on 23 April 2009.
  9. ^ "Final Cut Pro X Specifications". Apple.
  10. ^ "AVC-Intra QT". MXF4mac.
  11. ^ "EVS announces support of AVC-Intra".
  12. ^ "MainConcept SDKs". MainConcept. Archived from the original on 12 October 2010. Retrieved 24 September 2010.
  13. ^ "Omneon Server support for Panasonic's Advanced AVC-Intra HD format". Press release. 22 November 2007. Archived from the original on 5 June 2008. Retrieved 30 October 2013.
  14. ^ "Quantel demonstrates AVC-Intra". Archived from the original on 7 June 2008.
  15. ^ "Schweizer Fernsehen and tv productioncenter zürich (tpc) choose Quantel".
  16. ^ "V4 – for Enterprise sQ and Newsbox HD".
  17. ^ "Thomson's Grass Valley Boosts EDIUS Capabilities and User Interface".
  18. ^ "Supported import formats". Adobe.
  19. ^ "H.264/AVC Professional SDKs". Vanguard Software Solutions. Archived from the original on 5 October 2010. Retrieved 22 October 2010.
  20. ^ "VSS AVC-I Hardware Encoder" (PDF). Vanguard Software Solutions. Archived from the original (PDF) on 17 July 2011. Retrieved 22 October 2010.
  21. ^ "Git commit". FFmpeg git.
  22. ^ http://extranet.ateme.com/download.php?file=1316 [ dead link]
  23. ^ "GammaRED Engineering: SHINE Media Platform Overview".
  24. ^ "AVC-Intra Codec Search Result". Retrieved 8 October 2009.
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