NVRC: Neural Video Representation Compression

Recent advances in implicit neural representation (INR)-based video coding have demonstrated its potential to compete with both conventional and other learning-based approaches. With INR methods, a neural network is trained to overfit a video sequence, with its parameters compressed to obtain a compact representation of the video content. However, although promising results have been achieved, the best INR-based methods are still out-performed by the latest standard codecs, such as VVC VTM, partially due to the simple model compression techniques employed. In this paper, rather than focusing on representation architectures as in many existing works, we propose a novel INR-based video compression framework, Neural Video Representation Compression (NVRC), targeting compression of the representation. Based on the novel entropy coding and quantization models proposed, NVRC, for the first time, is able to optimize an INR-based video codec in a fully end-to-end manner. To further minimize the additional bitrate overhead introduced by the entropy models, we have also proposed a new model compression framework for coding all the network, quantization and entropy model parameters hierarchically. Our experiments show that NVRC outperforms many conventional and learning-based benchmark codecs, with a 24% average coding gain over VVC VTM (Random Access) on the UVG dataset, measured in PSNR. As far as we are aware, this is the first time an INR-based video codec achieving such performance. The implementation of NVRC will be released.

Paper

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Peer review

Reviewer m68p6/10 · confidence 4/52024-06-23

Summary

This paper proposes a INR-based video compression framework, Neural Video Representation Compression (NVRC), targeting compression of the implicit representation. Based on the proposed novel entropy coding and quantization models, NVRC is able to optimize an INR-based codec in a fully end-to-end manner. They also proposed a model compression framework for coding all the network, quantization and entropy model parameters hierarchically. Experiments show that NVRC outperforms many conventional and learning-based codecs, with a 24% overall coding gain over VTM (Random Access) on the UVG dataset, measured in PSNR.

Strengths

The manuscript is well written and easy to follow. Though the components exist in previous learned compression works, the proposed overall framework has novelty, which builds an elegant and efficient dependency among grid parameter, neural network parameter and hyperprior. The rate distortion performance is outstanding, making INR based methods better than VTM.

Weaknesses

Only UVG dataset is evaluated in the experiment. Please consider using more dataset as previous works do. In VAE based deep video compression, there exists a line of works like ‘Bit allocation using optimization, ICML 2023’, which is based on overfitting the latent representation to individual input video/GoP during encoding. This line of research is closely related to INR based video compression and should be discussed in the related works part. The complexity in Table 2 should be compared with previous methods like figure 3. The components used in this paper exist in previous works and should be discussed as previous works, including group based quantization (Fully quantized network for object detection, CVPR 2019), patch or block based parallel context model (Riddle: Lidar data compression with range image deep delta encoding, CVPR 2022; Checkerboard context model for efficient learned image compression, CVPR 2021). It is better to highlight the technical novelty in each component by comparing with those previous methods. Minor: L95, [11] is cited twice.

Questions

Please refer to the weakness part. Especially about the complexity and technical novelty comparision with previous works.

Rating

6

Confidence

4

Soundness

3

Presentation

3

Contribution

3

Limitations

The limitation is addressed in the manuscript.

Reviewer BGkd5/10 · confidence 5/52024-07-08

Summary

This paper focuses on the implicit neural representation for video compression, where several modifications are applied for the coding of feature grid and network layer. An enhanced training pipeline is also applied.

Strengths

1. The claimed performance over traditional codec and VAE-based codec is impressive.

Weaknesses

1. This paper claims the first fully end-to-end optimized INR-based framework. However, the problem of joint rate-distortion optimization has been addressed for INR-based compression in several existing works, including [13] and [Ref1] (missing in this paper). As these two papers have already been dedicated to enabling joint rate-distortion optimization in INR-based image compression, it is important to tell the difference in this paper when compared with these two previous works. I know these two previous works are for image, while this paper focuses on video. If the author think the difference between image and video in this part is large, the author should highlight the challenge and the corresponding solution of joint rate-distortion optimization for video when compared with image. [Ref1] Compression with Bayesian Implicit Neural Representations. NeurIPS 2023. 2. In Fig. 3 UVG-YUV 420, the PSNR of baseline DCVC-DC is about 40 dB at 0.03 bpp. However, in the Fig. 7 of DCVC-FM paper [https://github.com/microsoft/DCVC/tree/main/DCVC-FM], the PSNR of DCVC-DC is obviously larger than 41 dB at 0.03 bpp. So, for the same model, what is the reason for this large RD difference? 3. The results on MCL-JCV and HEVC B are missing. The ablation study is only based on two videos, which is not reliable. Currently I think this paper has very good performance. If the author can address my concerns and questions, I will consider increasing my rating.

Questions

1. In Table 1, what is the anchor method? Where is the result of the proposed NVRC in Table 1? 2. In Table 2, the Frame Enc FPS can be as high as 6.4 FPS, so can the NVRC encode a 600-frame UVG video within 100 seconds? From my understanding, the INR-based solution is quite slow for encoding. The author should give the encoding time from RGB video to binary bit-stream, and the decoding time from binary bit-stream to RGB video, where the actual arithmetic coding should be performed, especially when considering NVRC has auto-regressive model.

Rating

5

Confidence

5

Soundness

1

Presentation

2

Contribution

2

Limitations

no negative societal impact

Reviewer YLxP7/10 · confidence 4/52024-07-12

Summary

This paper describes the INR-based video codec NVRC. NVRC is optimized E2E and includes a quantized model which is critical for device reproducibility (though this is not discussed in the paper). The performance on UVG is good and significantly better than VVC VTM 20.0. Benchmarks are given for an NVIDIA 4090 and shows near real-time for decode but 100X slower than real-time for decode. Source code will be released when accepted.

Strengths

NVRC provides SOTA performance on the UVG dataset, provides a quantized model which is necessary for device reproducibility and efficient inference (both speed and power), and will release source code. Decoding time is near real-time on a NVIDIA 4090. It is a good solution for streaming scenarios.

Weaknesses

The encoding time is 100X off from real-time, making it not approprate for any real-time scenarios (e.g., video conferencing, surveillance, etc). There is no discussion of device reproducibility. Is the entire system quantized or is there still some floating point operations that could break device reproducibility? The evaluation is only done on UVG which is insufficient. Others to include (see DCVC-DC paper) are: MCL-JCV, HEVC B, HEVC C, HEVC D, HEVC E, HEVC RGB.

Questions

Is NVRC device reproducible, i.e., can the same stream be decoded accross any device? This would be a huge advantage. Floating point neural codecs are generally not device reproducible. In order for NVRC to be practical for video streaming the decode needs to run on NPUs. What is needed to run on an NPU and what is the benchmark for that (say an Apple M3).

Rating

7

Confidence

4

Soundness

3

Presentation

3

Contribution

3

Limitations

Yes, though because the evaluation is pretty weak (only UVG) there may be video scenarios that perform much worse than UVG.

Reviewer csHr7/10 · confidence 4/52024-07-13

Summary

- This paper proposes an INR-based video codec, NVRC, which aims to improve the rate efficiency by encoding parameters hierarchically. Experimental results of the proposed method have been shown in RD performance on the UVG dataset.

Strengths

- Experiments show good RD performance compared to recent INR-based codecs ([24], [23], [57]) (Figure 3), supporting this as an effective approach.

Weaknesses

- I thought that the usefulness of the method could be better demonstrated by showing how much the RD performance was improved for each of the changes in the proposed method (1-4 on page. 2). - The fact that the comparison was made with only one UVG dataset is also a weak point in demonstrating the general effectiveness of the method.

Questions

- Have you compared each of the changes in the proposed method (1-4 on page. 2) with other methods ([24], [23], [57])? For example, V4 in Table 3 is intended to show the usefulness of hierarchical parameter coding, but have you compared it with the parameter coding method used in INR-based codecs ([24], [23], [57])?

Rating

7

Confidence

4

Soundness

3

Presentation

3

Contribution

3

Limitations

- Section A.4 describes the limitations of the proposed method.

Reviewer m68p2024-08-09

Thanks for the relpy, I increase my score from ba to wa after considering all the reviewer comments.

Reviewer YLxP2024-08-11

Reply to rebuttal

Thanks for the response. I maintain my accept rating.

Program Chairsdecision2024-09-25

Decision

Accept (poster)

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