Method of and arrangement for estimating and compensatiing motion in a sequence of pictures and a picture transmission system provided with such an arrangement

An arrangement for estimating motion in a sequence of picture comprising first, second and third picture stores (10, 20, 30) arranged in series to ensure the permanent storage of three respective consecutive pictures denoted, for example, by their rank 2k, 2k+1, 2k+2 in the sequence of pictures, and a recursive displacement estimator (40) receiving the outputs of said first and third picture stores to update at each extension of the classifying tree the displacement vectors relating to the junctions of the tree and the send them to a delayed-decision circuit (50), said delayed-decision circuit receiving said updating information and also the outputs of said picture stores and supplying, for each block preceding the current block of L blocks, the information of the group in which this preceding block and the information of the corresponding displacement vector is finally classified. This arrangement is more specifically suitable for use in the transmission of high-definition television pictures, and also for use in the field of teleconferencing or the field of picture recording.