Abstract: Herein disclosed is a bit stream separating and merging system comprising a bit stream separating apparatus (1000) for inputting and transcoding an original bit stream A to separate into and generate a base bit stream B and one or more extended differential bit streams E*, each having a partial differential information segment between the original bit stream A and the base bit stream B, and a bit stream merging apparatus (2000) for inputting and merging the base bit stream B and the one or more extended differential bit streams E* to reconstruct the original bit stream A or a pseudo original bit stream B* approximately similar to the original bit stream A.

Abstract: Herein disclosed is a multiple-output bit stream separating apparatus for inputting an original MPEG-2 bit stream to separate into a plurality of transcoded MPEG-2 bit streams and a plurality of differential bit streams, and a multiple-output bit stream merging apparatus for inputting the transcoded MPEG-2 bit stream and the differential bit streams to reconstruct the original MPEG-2 bit stream. The bit rate of the transcoded MPEG-2 bit stream and the differential bit streams thus multiple times separated are much lower than that of the original MPEG-2 bit stream. This leads to the fact that the multiple-output bit stream separating apparatus and the multiple-input bit stream merging apparatus can promptly and reliably transmit and receive an original MPEG-2 bit stream having a large bit rate by transmitting and receiving a plurality of transcoded MPEG-2 bit streams and a plurality of differential bit streams in place of the original MPEG-2 bit stream.

Abstract: A coded signal separating apparatus, coded signal merging apparatus, coded signal separating and merging system, and methods thereof capable of performing scalable transmission of images are provided. There are provided a separating unit 1100, which is a separator separating means for separating a coded stream into a basic coded signal B having a smaller code amount than the coded stream and a plurality of extended coded signals E(m), which are used with the basic coded signal B to reconstruct an image, and a multiplexing unit 1600, which is a separator multiplexing means for optionally combining and multiplexing the basic coded signal B with the plurality of extended coded signals E(m) to generate a plurality of transmission coded signals St(1), to thereby generate and output separated streams St(1), which are multiplexed transmission coded signals.

Abstract: Herein disclosed is an apparatus for transcoding a coded multiplexed sound and moving picture sequence comprises the rate converter, which is operated to compress only the video bit streams, which have extremely large information volume.

Abstract: An apparatus for transcoding a coded moving picture sequence according to the present invention comprises a rate controller for adapting the scaling factor to perform the rate control over the coded moving picture sequence signal having a desired target bit rate.