Multi-bit video watermarking based on 3D DFT using perceptual models

In this paper, we propose a multi-bit watermarking technique for video sequences. An N-bit message is embedded in one unit of video fragment, in which a scene is employed as a watermarking unit. The proposed algorithm is fundamentally based on the three-dimensional discrete Fourier transform (DFT). In order to generate a watermark and optimum weighting factors, the perceptual properties for all the three-dimensional DFT coefficients should be computed. This strategy may require not only high computing complexity but also be undesirable. So, we design a perceptual model of an image in the DFT domain, and apply it to the video watermarking. The proposed perceptual model is expected to give high fidelity, and also its simplified version for video watermarking, estimating visual masks from a reference mask, is effective compared to fully calculated visual masks. Through the computer simulations, it will be shown that the proposed watermarking algorithm with the perceptual model yields effective performance for fidelity. Moreover, it will be also shown that the proposed scheme provides robustness against various attacks, such as compression, geometric attacks, and collusion attacks.