Live HDR video streaming on commodity hardware

Abstract

High Dynamic Range (HDR) video provides a step change in viewing experience, for example the ability to clearly see the soccer ball when it is kicked from the shadow of the stadium into sunshine. To achieve the full potential of HDR video, so-called true HDR, it is crucial that all the dynamic range that was captured is delivered to the display device and tone mapping is only confined to the display. Furthermore, to ensure widespread uptake of HDR imaging, it should be low cost and available on commodity hardware. This paper describes an end-to-end HDR pipeline for capturing, encoding and streaming high-definition HDR video in real-time using off-the-shelf components. All the lighting that is captured by HDR-enabled consumer cameras is delivered via the pipeline to any display, including HDR displays and even mobile devices with minimum latency. The system thus provides an integrated HDR video pipeline that includes everything from capture to post-production, archival and storage, compression, transmission, and display.

HDR video past, present and future: A perspective

“…To minimise ghosting artefacts, systems that use a multiple exposure approach to capture HDR video, such as the work by McNamee et al [16], require sophisticated, real-time de-ghosting algorithms [17]. Other HDR video systems avoid the need for multiple exposures by using, for example, multiple sensors with the same integration time through a single lens [10].…”

Fifty shades of HDR

“…Systems that use such a multiple exposure approach to capture HDR video of dynamic scenes, such as [15], require sophisticated, real-time de-ghosting algorithms to minimise any artefacts that arise from objects moving while the multiple exposures for a single frame are captured.…”