Multimedia Traffic Analysis
Irini Reljin, Branimir Reljin, Marija Zajeganović-Ivančić, Bojana Krstić
This tutorial covers the field of multimedia, in general,
with special attention to video compression techniques and standards,
and fractal and multifractal nature of multimedia traffic.
Modern multimedia traffic is characterized by a large
amount of information, high burstiness and an extraordinary
large number of source-destination nodes. The huge amount of
information, particularly image and video signals,
establishes a hard demand on signal compression.
The main goal in any video compression technique is to
achieve as high as possible compression ratio with invisible
degradation of video/audio material, implementing as simple
as possible algorithm. At the very beginning of the video
compression development, the two research directions with
opposite goals: low bit rates (for quasi-static video
conference sequences, known as 'head and shoulders') and
high quality (enabling the adoption of broadcast compression
standard), were established. Further development of video
compression brought a sharp limit between them,
distinguishing the applications targeted to 3G systems
(H.261, H.263) and high quality recording and broadcasting,
such as the well-established MPEG-2 standard. In the mean
time, the multimedia MPEG-4 compression technique, bringing
many versions and defocusing the goals of compression (not
demanding the lowest bit rate, nor demanding the highest
video quality), appeared. A number of individually small
improvements, but all producing significant benefits
necessary in multimedia, have been introduced. One of the
latest compression standards is H.264 AVC that has been
adopted by the two standardization bodies: the ITU and the
ISO. It brought some kind of bridge between the previous
standards - the idea was to enable rather good quality,
almost as good as in MPEG-2, at not obviously the smallest
bit rates. As it is very convenient for video distribution
over Internet and digital video broadcasting for handheld
monitors (DVB-H) is the first one in DVB family, which will
accept H.264 AVC as a non-MPEG-2 compression. The latest
compression standard, called Dirac, brought by BBC, will be
discussed here, too.
Analysis of multimedia traffic is based on publicly
available video traces, generated by using the bit streams
representing the actual bits, and produced as an alternative
for video traffic, carrying the number of bits used for the
encoding of the individual video frames. Those video traces
were analyzed by several methods, including fractal and
multifractal analyses of video traces. The simulation
results, that will be presented, explore the effects that
predictive and bidirectional coding, as well as quantization
scales, produce on the multifractal nature of different
movies. The importance of this investigation is obvious as
video traffic models can be derived from them.
The tutorial will include the three modules:
- Overview of video compression techniques - H.265 when and why?
- Multimedia traffic performances.
- Fractal and multifractal analyses of compressed video streams.
Dr. Irini Reljin
Dr. Irini Reljin teaches courses in Broadcast Technology and
Multimedia Technology in undergraduate studies, and Neural
Network Applications in Communications, Optical Networks as
well as Linear and Non-linear Signal Analysis in the
postgraduate studies at the Communications Department at the
Faculty of Electrical Engineering, University of Belgrade.
She published more than 150 scientific papers, several
chapters in international monographs, and several books in
Serbian. Papers have more than 20 citations (book,
international scientific journals and conference
proceedings, PhD thesis, on-line citation by the Ecoregional
Fund).
I. Reljin had a number of invited lectures at several
universities and institutions in USA, Greece, Romania,
Bulgaria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as in Serbia and
Montenegro (SCG): Medical Academy of Science, Military
Medical Academy, Mathematical Institute of Academy of
Sciences. She has been involved in a number of projects,
mostly in the field of video and multimedia technology.
I. Reljin is a member of different international
professional societies such as IEEE, SMPTE, BSUAE, ProMPEG
Forum, as well as national ones: ETRAN, Society of
Telecommunications and Gender Team.
Dr. Branimir Reljin teaches the following courses in
graduate and undergraduate studies: Circuit Theory, Digital
Image Processing, Medical Informatics, Telemedicine,
Artificial Neural Networks, Digital Signal Processing and
Network Synthesis.
He has published more than 350 papers in technical
journals and conferences, four books and several book
chapters, on different aspect of circuit theory, neural
networks, digital and medical image processing, fractal- and
multifractal analyses. His papers and books were cited more
than 60 times in journal and conference papers. He has been
awarded twice for the best paper at the largest national
(Yugoslav) scientific conference of the Society of
Electronics, Telecommunications, Computer Engineering,
Automation and Nuclear Engineering (ETRAN). He had a number
of invited lectures at several universities and institutions
in USA, Greece, Romania, Bulgaria, Bosnia and Herzegovina,
as well as in Serbia and Montenegro (SCG): Medical Academy
of Science, Military Medical Academy, Mathematical Institute
of Academy of Sciences.
Dr. Reljin was a project leader for several projects in
the field of Neural Networks, Medical Imaging and
Telemedicine, Signal Acquisition and Processing, and
currently he is a coordinator of Working Group 5 in European
project COST Action 292, "Semantic multimodal analysis of
digital media". He is the President of the 3C committee of
the Federal Office for Standardization and the member of the
Committee of national standards in medical informatics,
Group for information technologies, Federal Office for
Standardization.
B. Reljin is a member of several scientific and
professional societies, an IEEE SCG (former YU) CAS&SP
Chairman and the Vice-President of the national professional
society ETRAN, as well as a reviewer and a member of the
editorial boards of several journals and has been on the
program committees of a number of conferences. He is a
General Chair of the IEEE co-sponsored conferences Neural
Network Applications in Electrical Engineering (NEUREL).
Last updated September 26, 2005