NHK and Mitsubishi Electric have jointly developed the world's first High-Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC) encoder for 8K ultra HDTV "Super Hi-Vision" (SHV). SHV is the broadcasting medium of the near future. It makes viewers feel like they are really at the heart of the action, with 16 times the number of HD pixels and a 22.2 multichannel surround sound experience.

Set to be recognized as an international standard this year, HEVC offers about double the data compression of Advanced Video Coding (AVC) and about four times that of the MPEG-2 standard currently employed for digital HDTV broadcasting.

Here is how HEVC generally works: Video coding technology divides a frame into small blocks referred to as macroblocks. The prediction and transformation coding of the images is conducted in each block. HEVC offers variable blocks that can handle up to 64x64 pixels, changing the size according to texture, while AVC has relied on a fixed macroblock size of 16x16 pixels. It achieves both high compression and high resolution.

HEVC encoder

The high-volume SHV images are divided into 17 horizontal rows. The parallel processing of these rows makes it possible to achieve real-time coding of SHV images. The deterioration of picture quality at the row boundaries has been lessened by having rows share data concerning the speed, direction, etc. of moving objects.



NHK and Mitsubishi Electric are pursuing research and development of real-time coding of the 120Hz frame frequency of SHV.

The HEVC encoder will be displayed at the NHK Science & Technology Research Laboratories Open House 2013, which will take place from May 30th to June 2nd.

Specifications of HEVC encoder for SHV

- Video coding scheme: MPEG-H HEVC/H.265, Main 10 profile at Level 6.1
- Input/output resolution, frame rate: 7680 x 4320 pixels 60 Hz frame frequency (60 frame per sec.)
- Chroma format: 4:2:0
- Color precision: 10 bit
- Input/output interface: 3G-SDI x 17