This PhD thesis considers the performance evaluation and enhancement of video communication over wireless channels. The system model considers hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) with Chase combining and turbo product codes (TPC). The thesis proposes algorithms and techniques to optimize the throughput, transmission power and complexity of HARQ-based wireless video communication. A semi-analytical solution is developed to model the performance of delay-constrained HARQ systems. The semi-analytical and Monte Carlo simulation results reveal that significant complexity reduction can be achieved by noting that the coding gain advantage of the soft over hard decoding is reduced when Chase combining is used, and it actually vanishes completely for particular codes. Moreover, the thesis proposes a novel power optimization algorithm that achieves a significant power saving of up to 80%. Joint throughput maximization and complexity reduction is considered as well. A CRC (cyclic redundancy check)-free HARQ is proposed to improve the system throughput when short packets are transmitted. In addition, the computational complexity/delay is reduced when the packets transmitted are long. Finally, a content-aware and occupancy-based HARQ scheme is proposed to ensure minimum video quality distortion with continuous playback.