Abstract: Real-time pre-encoding dithering techniques mitigate or eliminate banding and other graphical artifacts in video frames prior to such video frames being encoded for transmission to and display by one or more client devices. For each of one or more input video frames, one or more random seeds and a frame identifier are received, and a dithering process is initiated for each of one or more pixels of the input video frame. The dithering process includes generating a YUV noise vector based on the random seeds and on the frame identifier, computing a YUV representation of the input pixel based on RGB color information for the input pixel, and generating a dithered output pixel by adding the generated YUV noise vector to the YUV representation of the input pixel.

Abstract: Pre-encoding noise parameterization techniques mitigate or eliminate banding and other graphical artifacts in video frames for decoding and presentation by a client device. For one or more input video frames, a quantization parameter associated with the input video frames is identified. Noise synthesis parameters are determined based on the identified quantization parameter, and the input video frames are encoded for transmission. The encoded video frames are transmitted to the client device along with the determined noise synthesis parameters, for use by the client device in generating synthetic noise to add to resulting video frames decoded by the client device.

Abstract: A two-pass encoding operation is implemented to encode one or more gaming frames into a game stream. The two-pass encoding operation includes a first encoding pass performed on a current frame. As a result of the first encoding pass, an estimated complexity for the current frame is determined. The resulting estimated complexity is then modulated according to a quality difference between reference frames used during the first pass encoding and a subsequent second pass encoding. Based on the modulated complexity, a quantization parameter is determined for the current frame that is then used to perform a second pass encoding on the current frame, resulting in an encoded frame. This encoded frame is then transmitted as part of a stream to a client system.

Abstract: Techniques for encoding game content for real-time cloud-gaming, and more specifically to using an adaptive statistical model in a moving window of previous frames up to a current frame to adaptively compute a lower-bound of a quantization parameter (QP) that corresponds to a chosen peak signal to noise ratio (PSNR) target. The result of this PSNR-guided encoding is significantly reducing the size of encoded frames (i.e., undershooting a target bit rate when there are no subjective quality losses on those frames using their PSNR as the guidance). These reductions mitigate bandwidth issues and improve the overall user experience because less bits transferred results in faster network transmission and decoding, as well as less platform overhead.

Abstract: A two-pass encoding operation is implemented to encode one or more gaming frames into a game stream. The two-pass encoding operation includes a first encoding pass performed on a current frame. As a result of the first encoding pass, an estimated complexity for the current frame is determined. The resulting estimated complexity is then modulated according to a quality difference between reference frames used during the first pass encoding and a subsequent second pass encoding. Based on the modulated complexity, a quantization parameter is determined for the current frame that is then used to perform a second pass encoding on the current frame, resulting in an encoded frame. This encoded frame is then transmitted as part of a stream to a client system.