Abstract: The present invention relates to a method of estimation and of hierarchised coding of the motion of image sequences, consisting in partitioning the current image into macroblocks, the macroblocks into four blocks and so on, and then determining at each level a motion-vector field associated with this division, by using an iterative and recursive estimation algorithm initialised with motion vectors estimated at the previous level, and in determining a final motion-vector field from the p resulting motion-vector fields. The motion-vector field is determined using the differences in luminances between blocks corresponding in the successive images through the estimated displacement vectors of the p levels of division corresponding to each block of minimum size, and by choosing as motion vector associated with the block of minimum size the one for which the difference in luminance is a minimum over this block. The invention applies in particular to the coding of HD-MAC television images.

Abstract: The device includes a set of processing macromodules connected in cascade and organized in accordance with hierarchical levels. Each macromodule is structured so as to partition the current image into macroblocks of a determined size corresponding to its hierarchical level so as to transmit a motion vector field to the block which follows it, and includes first circuits for calculating the displaced inter-image differences DFDi and the gradients on the basis of the values of luminance of the pixels of the video image and of the displacement vectors of each image preceding or following the current image; second circuits for performing blockwise the summations of the displaced inter-image differences and third circuits for performing corrections of the displacement vectors of the image.