An efficient bit-stream switching in multi-rate based video streaming systems

This paper proposes an efficient seamless switching method among non-scalable bit-streams in a multi-rate based video streaming system. It not only takes advantage of the high coding efficiency of non-scalable coding schemes (comparing with scalable schemes), but also allows the flexibility in the streaming service to accommodate the heterogeneity of the real-world networks. One unique feature of our method is that each SF frame will undergo some extra processing in the wavelet domain, using the SPIHT coding scheme. Another important step in our method is that we apply a novel bit allocation strategy onto all hierarchical trees in the SPIHT coding process so as to achieve a better coding quality. Comparing with other existing switching methods, our method can achieve the seamless switching at each pre-selected switching point at cost of less overhead bits and smaller quality loss.