Fast VVC intra prediction mode decision based on block shapes

Abstract

Since MPEG and VCEG jointly standardized the H.265/HEVC (High-Efficiency Video Coding) international standard in 2013, they have just completed H.266/VVC (Versatile Video Coding) [1] as the Final Draft International Standard (FDIS) in July 2020 through the Joint Video Experts Team (JVET) of ISO / IEC JTC1 / SC29 / WG11 MPEG and ITU-T SG16 / Q6 VCEG. VVC supports up to 87 intra coding modes including 65 general directional modes and 20 wide angular modes, which is increased more than twice compared to HEVC. VVC can accommodate not only more detailed intra prediction directions, but also so called wide angular modes which make its special sense in non-square coding blocks. The more detailed intra predictions naturally demand more computation in order to determine the most effective intra-prediction mode. In this sense, we investigate how to pre-prune the prediction candidate lists for a fast ISP intra mode decision and propose searching only a small number of prediction modes based on the shape of a block in the rate-distortion optimization (RDO)–based intra mode decision. The proposed method is verified to decrease the intra prediction processing time with only a little increase in the bit rate and a negligible reduction in PSNR values.