VLIW processor powers smart devices
At the recent American Society for Industrial Security (ASIS) trade show, Equator Technologies (Campbell, CA; www.equator.com) demonstrated smart cameras and intelligent video security devices based around the company's BSP-15 processor. Other companies, such as DynaPel Systems (New York, NY; www.dynapel.com), IQinVision (Santa Ana Heights, CA; www.iqeye.com), Reality Commerce Corp. (RCC; Richmond, BC, Canada; www.realitycommerce.com), and Vcon (Herzliya, Israel; www.vcon.com), showed motion-tracking, camera-steadying, face-recognition, and digital video recording applications.
The C/C++ programmable BSP-15 processor is based around a VLIW core that delivers up to 40 billion operations/second. With four 32-bit integer ALUs, the device is supplied with a set of development tools, which include the company's iMMediaTools software-development kit, reference boards, and third-party software. Optimized for video processing, the device simultaneously computes video- and image-processing algorithms.
To ease systems integration, Equator's Tetra CPU development system and optional AV module provide a hardware-reference design that allows applications such as smart cameras, digital video recorders, and streaming video appliances to be developed rapidly. Featuring a BSP-15 processor, memory, Ethernet capability, and power supply, a CPU board can also be augmented with the company's AV module to add video and audio I/O.
Vcon demonstrated Equator's Tetra platform running video over IP software. Vcon's video over IP software includes ITU-T H.263+ video compression and decompression algorithms, an H.323 network protocol stack, and G.711 audio compression and decompression. It can be used by systems integrators to develop IP-based video security and surveillance applications.
Targeting video-compression applications, both Dynapel and RCC have ported their MPEG-4 software products to the BSP-15 processor. Dynapel's advanced simple visual profile codec is supplied with a Windows Media Player plug-in and Internet Streaming Media Alliance-compliant streaming components to allow remote viewing of any baseline H.263 bitstream, MPEG-4 simple or advanced-simple file or stream formats. Dynapel's advanced-simple profile also includes global motion compensation and 1/4-pel accurate motion vectors. At the ASIS show, DynaPel and Equator also demonstrated DynaPel's steady tracker software running on the BSP-15 processor. The software provides stabilization of shaky video surveillance video and allows unattended security CCTV cameras to follow moving objects.
Also supporting the simple visual profile on Equator's BSP-15 processor, RCC's MPEG-4 encoder provides real-time encoding of video at 704 × 480-pixel resolution. IQinVision has specified the 4CIF real-time MPEG-4 encoder from RCC for use in its next-generation VLIW-based IQeye4 smart camera. With 1288 × 968-pixel, progressive-scan resolution, the IQeye4 camera will use the processor to offer developers programmable smart cameras for image-analysis applications.