An apparatus (216) is provided for encoding image data, which comprises processing means (220) for processing a shape-adaptive discrete cosine transformation, an input buffer (217), a transpose memory (218) and an output buffer (219). The apparatus (216) receives image data as picture screen elements (pixels), each of which is defined with respective luminance, chrominance and alpha values (301). The input buffer (217) is configured to store pixels vertically (401) as the image data (402) is received. The processing means (220) is configured to process a plurality of first coefficients from the vertically-stored pixels and a plurality of second coefficients from the first coefficients. The transpose memory (218) is configured to store the plurality of first coefficient horizontally (403) as they are output. The output buffer (219) is configured to output (406) the second coefficients (407) as they become available from the processing means (405), whereby the second coefficients are output with minimal latency.

A system (101) and method are provided for extracting semantic events from a digitised audio-visual sequence (504) depicting sporting events. The system (101) comprises digitised audio-visual sequence input means (206, 207, 211, 212), memory means (209), data processing means (208), and data outputting means (206, 207, 211, 212). Said memory means (209) stores instructions (503), which configure said processing means (208) to filter (304) said digitised audio-visual sequence (504) according to first image data processing criteria (403) to generate first output audio-visual data (506, 507). Said instructions (503) also configure said processing means (208) to process (701, 702, 703) said first output audio-visual data (506, 507) to generate second audio-visual data processing criteria (809, 914, 1016, 1207) and filter (704) said first output audio-visual data (506, 507) according to said second audio-visual data processing criteria to generate second output audio-visual data (513). Said instructions (503) also configure said processing means (208) to output (306) said second output audio-visual data (513) with said data outputting means.

Related:

An apparatus (101) is provided for encoding audio-visual data (405, 407), which includes data input means (211), processing means (201), memory means (202, 203, 204) and networking means (206, 207). The memory means (203) or (204) stores instructions and visual data (405, 407) as a sequence (402) of frames (401, 405) defined by a plurality of blocks (408, 409) of pixels configured with respective red, green, blue and alpha values. The processing means (201) processes (603) a sum of absolute differences between alpha values of pixels of a first block (408) thereof in a current frame (405) and alpha values of pixels of a first block (409) thereof in a reference frame (401) as a minimum sum of absolute differences (606). The processing means (201) processes (70) respective partial sums of absolute differences between the alpha values of the pixels of portions of the block 4-8 in the current frame (405) and alpha values of pixels of portions of subsequent blocks (409) thereof in the reference frame (401). The processing means (201) ceases processing the partial sums of absolute differences when any of the partial sums of absolute differences exceeds (70) the minimum sum of absolute differences. The processing means (201) ceases processing the partial sums of absolute differences when the accumulation (70) of the partial sums of absolute differences exceeds the minimum sum of absolute differences. The processing means (201) declares the accumulated partial sums of absolute differences as the minimum sum if it is less than the sum of absolute differences processed from the first reference block, such that a motion vector for shape is estimated (510) for encoding (511) the current frame (405).