This paper considers designing and applying punctured irregular repeat-accumulate (IRA) codes for scalable image and video transmission over binary symmetric channels. IRA codes of different rates are obtained by puncturing the parity bits of a mother IRA code, which uses a systematic encoder. One of the main ideas presented here is the design of the mother code such that the entire set of higher rate codes obtained by puncturing are good. To find a good unequal error protection for embedded bit streams, we employ the fast joint source-channel coding algorithm in Hamzaoui et al. to minimize the expected end-to-end distortion. We test with two scalable image coders (SPIHT and JPEG-2000) and two scalable video coders (3-D SPIHT and H.26L-based PFGS). Simulations show better results with IRA codes than those reported in Banister et al. with JPEG-2000 and turbo codes. The IRA codes proposed here also have lower decoding complexity than the turbo codes used by Banister et al.

This paper presents a joint source-channel coding framework based on layered source coding and Reed-Solomon channel coding for unequal error protection. An iterative procedure is described to search for the best source coding rate and the optimal UEP of layered bitstreams. We apply our JSCC technique to transmission of JPEG-2000 coded images over binary symmetric channels. Compared to results reported in the literature, our UEP based approach gives better results while having lower complexity.

This paper proposes an integrated approach to Internet video streaming and multicast (e.g., receiver-driven layered multicast (RLM)) based on combined wavelet video coding and error control. We design a packetized wavelet video (PWV) coder to facilitate its integration with error control. The PWV coder produces packetized layered bitstreams that are independent among layers while being embedded within each layer. Thus a lost packet only renders the following packets in the same layer useless. Based on the PWV coder, we search for a multi-layered error control strategy that optimally trades off source and channel coding for each layer under a given transmission rate to mitigate the effects of packet loss. Our integrated approach extends the single-layered approach for RLM. Theoretical analysis shows a gain of up to one dB on a channel with 20% packet loss. This is also substantiated by our simulations with a gain of up to 2.2 dB.

This paper proposes an integrated approach to receiver-driven layered multicast (RLM) based on packetized wavelet video (PWV) coding and error control. The PWV coder produces packetized layered bitstreams that are independent among layers while being embedded within each layer. Error control determines the optimal joint source-channel coding trade-off given the available transmission rate to mitigate the effects of packet loss. The PWV coder is designed to facilitate its integration with error control for RLM such that packets from different source layers are generated in a rate-distortion optimized way and a lost packet only renders the following packets in the same layer useless. Our work extends the single-layered approach in Chou et al., (2001). Theoretical analysis shows a gain of up to 1 dB on a channel with 20% packet loss over results presented in Chou. This gain is also substantiated by our simulations with a gain of up to 2.2 dB.