Hierarchical packing of syntax elements

A method of refining motion vectors to improve video coding performance while using a merge mode in motion vector signaling, the method comprising:

• performing one or more refinement searches on a plurality of macroblocks of a current frame, wherein the one or more refinement searches includes:
• identifying one or more candidate motion vectors in a reference frame;
• reducing the one or more candidate motion vectors to obtain reduced candidates, wherein reducing the one or more candidate motion vectors comprises:
• reducing the one or more candidate motion vectors based, at least in part, on a relative proximity of the one or more candidate motion vectors;
• and
• merging two or more candidate motion vectors into a single candidate;
• determining one or more distortion values based, at least in part, on the reduced candidate motion vectors;
• and
• coding motion data based, at least in part, on the one or more refinement searches.

A method of refining motion vectors to improve video coding performance while using a merge mode in motion vector signaling, the method comprising:

• performing one or more refinement searches on a plurality of macroblocks of a current frame, wherein the one or more refinement searches includes:
• identifying one or more candidate motion vectors in a reference frame, based, at least in part, on a previous refinement search, and based, at least in part, on a voting scheme, wherein the voting scheme comprises:
• assigning a vote to each of a plurality of best candidates based, at least in part, on one or more best candidates from the previous refinement search;
• and
• resolving tie-breakers based, at least in part, on a respective block size of each of the plurality of best candidates;
• and
• reducing the one or more candidate motion vectors to obtain reduced candidate motion vectors;
• determining one or more distortion values based, at least in part, on the reduced candidate motion vectors;
• and
• coding motion data based, at least in part, on the one or more refinement searches.