ESTIMATION OF B FRAME AVERAGE RATE QUANTIZATION PARAMETER (QP) IN A GROUP OF PICTURES (GOP)

Rate-QP estimation for a B picture is disclosed which involves: providing an input group of pictures (GOP); selecting an input B picture within the GOP; and outputting, to a computer readable medium, a bit rate corrected Rate-QP, R(QP), for the input B picture. The outputting step may involve calculating intra/non-intra luma and chroma Rate-QP estimates from corresponding intra/non-intra luma and chroma histograms; offsetting the intra/non-intra chroma Rate-QP estimate to form respective offset intra/non-intra chroma estimates; and setting a bit rate corrected Rate-QP for the input B picture to a corrected sum of the previous estimates. The histograms are formed using an input of the lowest SATD forward, backward, and bidirectional prediction coefficients, and the intra prediction coefficients, where an intra/non-intra mode is selected, which results in a lowest SATD for each macroblock in the GOP. The methods may be implemented into a computer program, possibly resident in advanced video encoders.