4G Wireless Video Communications

Foreword

4G Wireless Video Communications is a broad title with a wide scope, bridging video signal processing, video communications, and 4G wireless networks. Currently, 4G wireless communication systems are still in their planning phase. The new infrastructure is expected to provide much higher data rates, lower cost per transmitted bit, more flexible mobile terminals, and seamless connections to different networks. Along with the rapid development of video coding and communications techniques, more and more advanced interactive multimedia applications are emerging as 4G network “killer apps”.

Depending on the reader's background and point of view, this topic may be considered and interpreted with different perspectives and foci. Colleagues in the multimedia signal processing area know firsthand the effort and ingenuity it takes to save 1 bit or increase the quality of the reconstructed video during compression by 0.5 dB. The increased bandwidth of 4G systems may open the door to new challenges and open issues that will be encountered for first time or were neglected before. Some topics, such as content interactivity, scalability, and understandability may be reconsidered and be given higher priority, and a more aggressive approach in investigating and creating new applications and service concepts may be adopted. On the other hand, for colleagues with communications and networking backgrounds, it is important to keep in mind that in the multimedia content delivery scenario, ...