Simplified block matching criteria for motion estimation

In this paper, we propose fast block matching criteria to reduce the implem entation complexity of motion estimation in VLSI video coders. Based on gen eralized quantization of pixel difference measures, the block matching crit eria combined with bitmap exclusive-OR (XOR) concept can be realized by sho rt length adders and a multi-input binary counter. The proposed approach ca n be treated as a generalization of the pixel difference classification (PD C) criterion. Simulation results show that the proposed block-matching crit eria along with various block search algorithms achieve better results than the PDC and obtain nearly the same performance as the mean absolute differ ence (MAD) criterion. However, the complete gate-level synthesis of the pro posed matching criterion is much less than those of the MAD and the PDC in the VLSI implementation.