Abstracts

Video streaming in the context of HTTP Adaptive Streaming (HAS) is replacing legacy media platforms and its market share is growing rapidly due to its simplicity, reliability, and standard support (e.g., MPEG-DASH). It results in an increasing number of video content, where nowadays, video accounts for the vast majority of today’s internet traffic either in the form of user-generated content (UGC) or pristine cinematic content. For HAS, the video is usually encoded in multiple versions (i.e., representations) of different resolutions, bitrates, codecs, etc. and each representation is divided into chunks (i.e., segments) of equal length (e.g., 2-10 second) to enable dynamic, adaptive switching during streaming based on the user’s context conditions (e.g., network conditions, device characteristics, user preferences).

The optimized media delivery requires optimization of streaming from an end-to-end aspect, including content provisioning, and content consumption. In content provisioning, the quality of the video to be streamed is vital; for example cinematic content is pristine, while UGC content is already distorted. Thus video coding/transcoding is crucial for both the efficient distribution to the end-user (real-time or on demand) and the high quality of experience. There is a plethora of different techniques for a smooth visual experience. Many researchers focus on improving the compression efficiency of the standardised video codecs (e.g., HEVC, VVC, VP9, AV1, AVS3, etc.). Other researchers are focused on driving the video codecs using perceptual models to improve the delivery. At a HAS streaming level, the video service providers focus on the construction of optimized bitrate ladders per content that can also reduce the streaming cost. New immersive media formats add to the complexity of the optimization required for an end-to-end quality of experience.

The goal of this special session is to provide a forum for sharing and discussing cutting-edge research in Media Streaming and Quality Assessment. Possible topics that would be a good fit for this session include but are not limited to:

• video coding parameter selection for optimized streaming;
• transcoding techniques for the improved delivery of media;
• perceptual evaluation of immersive media;
• end-to-end video adaptive streaming methods;
• pre- and post-processing for improved compression and delivery.