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Attention-based neural networks for chroma intra prediction in video coding

Blanch, Marc, Blasi, Saverio, Smeaton, Alan F. orcid logoORCID: 0000-0003-1028-8389, O'Connor, Noel E. orcid logoORCID: 0000-0002-4033-9135 and Mrak, Marta (2020) Attention-based neural networks for chroma intra prediction in video coding. IEEE Journal on Selected Topics in Signal Processing . ISSN 1932-4553

Abstract
Neural networks can be successfully used to improve several modules of advanced video coding schemes. In particular, compression of colour components was shown to greatly benefit from usage of machine learning models, thanks to the design of appropriate attention-based architectures that allow the prediction to exploit specific samples in the reference region. However, such architectures tend to be complex and computationally intense, and may be difficult to deploy in a practical video coding pipeline. This work focuses on reducing the complexity of such methodologies, to design a set of simplified and cost-effective attention-based architectures for chroma intra-prediction. A novel size-agnostic multi-model approach is proposed to reduce the complexity of the inference process. The resulting simplified architecture is still capable of outperforming state-of-the-art methods. Moreover, a collection of simplifications is presented in this paper, to further reduce the complexity overhead of the proposed prediction architecture. Thanks to these simplifications, a reduction in the number of parameters of around 90% is achieved with respect to the original attentionbased methodologies. Simplifications include a framework for reducing the overhead of the convolutional operations, a simplified cross-component processing model integrated into the original architecture, and a methodology to perform integer-precision approximations with the aim to obtain fast and hardware-aware implementations. The proposed schemes are integrated into the Versatile Video Coding (VVC) prediction pipeline, retaining compression efficiency of state-of-the-art chroma intra-prediction methods based on neural networks, while offering different directions for significantly reducing coding complexity.
Metadata
Item Type:Article (Published)
Refereed:Yes
Uncontrolled Keywords:Chroma intra prediction; convolutional neural networks; attention algorithms; multi-model architectures; complexity reduction; video coding standards
Subjects:Computer Science > Machine learning
Computer Science > Digital video
Computer Science > Video compression
DCU Faculties and Centres:DCU Faculties and Schools > Faculty of Engineering and Computing > School of Computing
DCU Faculties and Schools > Faculty of Engineering and Computing > School of Electronic Engineering
Research Initiatives and Centres > INSIGHT Centre for Data Analytics
Publisher:Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Official URL:http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/JSTSP.2020.3044482
Copyright Information:© 2020 IEEE
Use License:This item is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License. View License
Funders:Science Foundation Ireland, European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska Curie grant agreement No 765140.
ID Code:25285
Deposited On:07 Jan 2021 15:22 by Noel Edward O'connor . Last Modified 07 Jan 2021 15:22
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