Efficient Sub-pixel Motion Compensation in Learned Video Codecs

Abstract: Motion compensation is a key component of video codecs. Conventional codecs (HEVC and VVC) have carefully refined this coding step, with an important focus on sub-pixel motion compensation. On the other hand, learned codecs achieve sub-pixel motion compensation through simple bilinear filtering. This paper offers to improve learned codec motion compensation by drawing inspiration from conventional codecs. It is shown that the usage of more advanced interpolation filters, block-based motion information and finite motion accuracy lead to better compression performance and lower decoding complexity. Experimental results are provided on the Cool-chic video codec, where we demonstrate a rate decrease of more than 10% and a lowering of motion-related decoding complexity from 391 MAC per pixel to 214 MAC per pixel. All contributions are made open-source at https://github.com/Orange-OpenSource/Cool-Chic