MPEG-I Future Directions

An overview is provided on MPEG's work on coding for Immersive Media, with a focus on MPEG-I, where “I” denotes “Immersive”. The MPEG-I project roadmap includes plans for a family of standards. — The recently completed Omnidirectional Media Framework (OMAF) systems specification provided support for VR/360$dg video with 3 Degrees of Freedom (3DoF). A planned OMAF version 2 will provide improved support for overlays and multiple viewports, and head-scale motion parallax. MPEG-I will provide support for full 6 Degree of Freedom (6DoF) audio and video, through several activities with target specification dates that range from 2020 to 2022. The MPEG Audio group is developing audio wave field coding, which goes beyond the MPEG-H Part 3 Spatial Audio standard, to provide audio playback from any position or orientation. — A new “VVC” Versatile Video Coding standard is being developed in collaboration with ITU-T Study Group 16 Question 6, which aims at a 50% bitrate reduction vs HEVC. VVC targets a wide range of content types, including High Dynamic Range (HDR) and 360$dg video. Future extensions of VVC may provide support for light fields. — The MPEG-I Graphics group is developing a Point Cloud Coding standard, which targets both lossy lossless compression. Point clouds are typically captured using multiple cameras and depth sensors in various setups, but as usual in MPEG, acquisition is outside of the scope of the standard. The standard targets efficient geometry and attribute compression, scalable/progressive coding, as well as coding of sequences of point clouds captured over time.

Published

2018-10

Content type

Original Research

Keywords

VR, 360 video, omnidirectional video, point cloud coding, immersive media

DOI

10.5594/M001830

ISBN

978-1-61482-960-7