Enabling Improved Image Format Conversion with FPGAs

Broadcast infrastructure systems—such as servers, switchers, head-end encoders, and specialty studio displays—support a multitude of input image formats, and commonly require images to be converted to high definition (HD) or a different resolution before they can be stored, encoded, or displayed. While specialized ASSPs have addressed this market with varying degrees of success, the challenge has been to address the extremely diverse and application-specific requirements of broadcast equipment vendors with a single chip. For example, overall delay is very important in switcher applications, latency is a key factor for displays and video-conferencing systems, and image quality is a high priority for post-production equipment. In addition to these specific application needs, the devices must also support a multitude of frame rates, resolutions, and formats.