Video effects IP core for hi def DVD recorders, camcorders and set tops speeds design with OCP interfaces

Next-generation product capabilities for DVD recorders, set-top boxes and digital camcorders will center on creating, sharing and consuming digital content, as the battle for leadership in the digital home intensifies. Jetstream Media Technologies' new JetFx™ IP core adds PC like video editing functionality such as real-time transitions, color effects, title and clip-art animation as well as the automatic creation of personal movies based simply on a user selected theme. Figure 1 is the block diagram of a sample DVD recorder application in which JetFx IP core is incorporated in the design to provide real-time video effects.

View full size
Figure 1

CE Design Issues
Within the CE market, several factors make it difficult to achieve success for new functionality. Features must be powerful but easy to use. Designs must be sophisticated but easy to integrate and cost sensitive. Time-to-market is critical so design reuse, partnerships, and flexibility are often the difference between a successful product and a missed opportunity.

From a designer’s perspective, an ideal video effect-generating device for the CE market has several desirable attributes:

• Support wide selections of video effects all in real-time
• Programmable to allow new effects to be easily introduced
• Support HD (1080i) resolutions for the next generation of products
• Industry standardized interfaces for quick integration with existing designs
• Efficient, low cost and standardized memory architecture
• Optimized for small silicon area and low power for cost sensitive applications

There are different approaches that designers could take to implement advanced video effect functionality on their CE devices. The two most common approaches would be to use embedded DSP or RISC processors.

These approaches however, have several important drawbacks that make them impractical for CE applications. First, they are often too costly given that amount of processing power required to perform even simple video effects. Secondly, they force the designer to write, debug and maintain complex software for video effect processing that may not be in their core competency.

A more viable approach would be to use application specific IP cores that can reduce software complexity, meet cost-performance targets, and offer the flexibility necessary for quick time-to-market.

Introducing the JetFx IP Core
The patent-pending JetFx IP core is designed to meet all these desirable attributes. With its ability to compute higher order functions, the JetFx IP core is capable of calculating many different mathematical functions while maintaining a small silicon size. The high order calculation uses only adders, not multipliers – fundamentally simplifying the complexity of the texture mapping.

The screen can be divided into several regions according to the special effect being applied. The JetFx IP core then calculates texture mapping for each region. The texture mapping is not only for simple 2D effects such as rotation and scaling, but also for non-linear texture mapping to approximate 3D perspective projection and warping. In addition to texture mapping, these mathematical functions are also used to define primitive elements that form complex shapes or gradient colored objects.

The JetFx IP core is fully parameterized to allow different performance and functionality options to be selected based on the target application. For price sensitive consumer products where cost can be a driving factor, a modest performance, less feature rich design can be selected. For high end consumer or professional products where performance is paramount, a full set of functionality and performance enhancing capabilities can be included such as anti-aliasing, high definition support, and title animation.

For complex visual effects, more sophisticated mathematic functions are needed. JetFx IP core assembles families of higher order complex mathematic functions by performing linear combination operations on a base set of simpler functions. By carefully selecting portions of few family member functions, many smooth functions can be formed on the fly for visual effect generation. In addition, the multiplications used by these linear combination operations can usually be simplified to shift and add operations by choosing appropriate base calculations. This helps reduce silicon complexity and size while creating new effects.


The Wine Bottle Effect

Next: Page flips, warp and cube effects