In video coding mainly there are three types of frames namely: intra-coded frame (I frame),predictive coded frame(P frame) and bidirectional predictive–coded frame(B frame).Frames which are coded without any reference to past frames are known as I frames or key frames. P frames are determined based on prior I frame or P frame and cannot be built if the decoder has not decoded the previous frame. I frames and P frames are known as anchor frames. B frames are predicted from the past and future I frame or P frame. Depending on the H.264 profile, different types of frames such as I-frames, P-frames and B-frames, maybe used by an encoder. An I-frame, or intra frame, is a self-contained frame that can be independently decoded without any reference to other images. …show more content…
I-frames are needed as starting points for new viewers or resynchronization points if the transmitted bit stream is damaged. I-frames can be used to implement fast-forward, rewind and other random access functions. An encoder will automatically insert I-frames at regular intervals or on demand if new clients are expected to join in viewing a stream. The drawback of I-frames is that they consume much more bits, but on the other hand, they do not generate many artifacts. A P-frame, which stands for predictive inter frame, makes references to parts of earlier I and/or Pframe(s) to code the frame. P-frames usually require fewer bits than I-frames, but a drawback is that they are very sensitive to transmission errors because of the complex dependency on earlier P and I reference frames. A B-frame, or bi-predictive inter frame, is a frame that makes references to both an earlier reference frame and a future