DETAILED ACTION
Response to Arguments
The amendment filed 9/23/2025 have been entered and made of record.
The Applicant has canceled claim(s) 3 and 13.
The application has pending claim(s) 1-2, 4-12, and 14-20.
In response to the amendments filed on 9/23/2025:
The claim rejections under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph have been entered and therefore the Examiner withdraws the rejections under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph.
The Applicant's arguments with respect to claims 1-2, 4-12, and 14-20 have been considered but are moot in view of the new ground(s) of rejection at least because the Applicant has amended independent claim(s) 1 and 11 respectively.
Applicant’s arguments, see pages 5-9, filed 9/23/2025, with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 1-2, 4-12, and 14-20 under 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 respectively have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in further view of the newly found prior art references Go et al (JP 2001147110 A - the attached English language translation is used hereinafter as the Official English language translation of this JP document) and Zhou et al (CN 103900494 A - the attached English language translation is used hereinafter as the Official English language translation of this CN document) respectively. Further discussions are addressed in the prior art rejection section below. Therefore claims 1-2, 4-12, and 14-20 are still not in condition for allowance because they are still not patentably distinguishable over the prior art references.
Claim Interpretation
The Examiner notes that the claim limitation “where each feature of the binary state random pattern is associated with an elongated line orientation having at least one of: vertical elongated features and horizontal elongated features” in claims 6 and 16 have each been read disjunctively [construed to mean and use a non-exclusive logical OR] in accordance with paragraph [0138] of the originally filed disclosure.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claim(s) 1-2, 4-5, 7-12, 14-15, and 17-20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kaino (US 2021/0287334 A1, as applied in previous Office Action) in view of Kishiwada et al (JP 2018009977 A - the previously attached English language translation is used hereinafter as the Official English language translation of this JP document, as applied in previous Office Action), and further in view of Go et al (JP 2001147110 A - the attached English language translation is used hereinafter as the Official English language translation of this JP document).
Re Claim 1: Kaino discloses a dimensioning assembly (see Kaino, Fig. 1, [0045]) comprising: a light emitting assembly (see Kaino, Fig. 1, [0067]-[0073], light emission control and light source); a full field modulation mask disposed to modulate, into a random pattern, light received from the light emitting assembly (see Kaino, Fig. 1, [0067]-[0073], random pattern mask); and projecting optics comprising at least a projection lens disposed to project the random pattern without duplication optical elements (see Kaino, Fig. 1, [0067]-[0073], projection lens, wherein the random pattern is generated using the random pattern mask without duplication optical elements).
However Kaino fails to explicitly disclose where Kishiwada discloses wherein the projecting optics further comprises a uniform intensity distribution component configured to distribute light in the random pattern such that an intensity level of the random pattern is in uniformity (see Kishiwada, page 3/33 at lines 29-45, in the projection optical system: uniform luminance distribution on the projection surface of the object).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Kaino’s apparatus/method using Kishiwada’s teachings by including the uniform luminance distribution processing to Kaino’s projection lens in order to improve and ensure the uniformity of luminance on the projection surface of the object (see Kishiwada, page 3/33 at lines 29-30 and 40-45).
However Kaino as modified by Kishiwada fails to explicitly disclose where Go discloses distribute light in the random pattern such that an intensity level of the random pattern is above a uniformity threshold (see Go, Page 7/84 at lines 3-8 and 31-32, Page 10/84 at lines 17-36, Page 14/84 at lines 6-11, Page 16/84 at lines 21-23, Page 17/84 at lines 8-10, Page 18/84 at lines 2-4).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to further modify Kaino’s apparatus/method, as modified by Kishiwada, using Go’s teachings by including threshold processing to Kaino’s [as modified by Kishiwada] uniform luminance distribution projection processing in order to improve the random pattern with improved suitability and sufficient nonperiodicity (see Go, Page 7/84 at lines 3-8 and 31-32, Page 10/84 at lines 17-36, Page 14/84 at lines 6-11, Page 16/84 at lines 21-23, Page 17/84 at lines 8-10, Page 18/84 at lines 2-4).
Re Claim 2: Kaino further discloses wherein the projecting optics further comprises a field correction component (see Kaino, Fig. 1, [0067]-[0073], projection lens comprises lens to view necessary angle of view, focal length, etc.).
Re Claim 4: Kaino further discloses a camera module having one or more image sensors and an imaging lens assembly (see Kaino, Fig. 1, [0055]-[0056], [0058]-[0061], left and right cameras with imaging lens); and a processing system configured to detect and analyze positions of elements of each random pattern (see Kaino, Fig. 1, [0045], [0055]-[0056], [0058]-[0061], [0090], calculating depth information based on the difference image which uses the pattern image acquired from the cameras).
Re Claim 5: Kaino as modified by Kishiwada and Go further discloses wherein the random pattern produced by a physical mask layer or a modulation scheme (see Kaino, [0064], the pattern image being monochrome, [0067]-[0073], random pattern mask produced by a mesh like plate) wherein the random pattern comprises a binary state (see Kishiwada, page 7/33 at lines 6-7).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to further modify Kaino’s apparatus/method, as modified by Kishiwada and Go, using Kishiwada’s teachings by including the binary random pattern to Kaino’s [as modified by Kishiwada and Go] monochrome random pattern in order to improve the recognition of the random pattern and thereby improve the accuracy of the depth/distance measurement (see Kishiwada, page 2/33 at lines 5-6, page 7/33 at lines 6-7).
Re Claim 7: Kaino as modified by Kishiwada and Go further discloses wherein the random pattern comprises a random pattern comprising features (see Kaino, [0064], the pattern image being colored, [0067]-[0073], random pattern mask produced by a mesh like plate) wherein the random pattern comprises a multi-state random pattern comprising features associated with at least three states (see Kishiwada, page 7/33 at lines 6-7).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to further modify Kaino’s apparatus/method, as modified by Kishiwada and Go, using Kishiwada’s teachings by including the three state random pattern to Kaino’s [as modified by Kishiwada and Go] colored random pattern in order to improve the recognition of the random pattern and thereby improve the accuracy of the depth/distance measurement (see Kishiwada, page 2/33 at lines 5-6, page 7/33 at lines 6-7).
Re Claim 8: Kishiwada further discloses wherein each feature state of the multi-state random pattern is associated with a different feature position shift (see Kishiwada, page 7/33 at lines 6-7, page 9 at lines 9-16). See claim 7 for obviousness and motivation statements.
Re Claim 9: Kaino further discloses wherein the light emitting assembly comprises one or more light generation sources to produce light patterns (see Kaino, Fig. 1, [0067]-[0070], light emitting diode).
Re Claim 10: Kishiwada further discloses wherein the light generation source comprises one or more laser modules (see Kishiwada, page 3/33 at lines 29-30 and 40-45, laser diode).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to further modify Kaino’s apparatus/method, as modified by Kishiwada and Go, using Kishiwada’s teachings by including the laser diode to Kaino’s [as modified by Kishiwada and Go] light emitting diode in order to improve and ensure the uniformity of luminance on the projection surface of the object (see Kishiwada, page 3/33 at lines 29-30 and 40-45).
Re Claim 11: As to claim 11, the claim is the corresponding method claim to claim 1 respectively. The discussions are addressed with regard to claim 1. Further, Kaino further discloses a method comprising: receiving light from a light emitting assembly (see Kaino, Fig. 1, [0067]-[0073], receiving light from the light emission control and light source); modulating, by a full field modulation mask the received light into a random pattern (see Kaino, Fig. 1, [0067]-[0073], random pattern mask); projecting the random pattern without duplication optical elements by a projecting optics comprising at least a projection lens (see Kaino, Fig. 1, [0067]-[0073], projecting the random pattern with the projection lens, wherein the random pattern is generated using the random pattern mask without duplication optical elements). See claim 1 for obviousness and motivation statements.
As to claim 12, the discussions are addressed with regard to claim 2 respectively.
Re Claim 14: Kaino further discloses detecting and analyzing positions of elements of each random pattern by a processing system (see Kaino, Fig. 1, [0045], [0055]-[0056], [0058]-[0061], [0090], calculating depth information based on the difference image which uses the pattern image acquired from the cameras).
As to claims 15 and 17-20, the discussions are addressed with regard to claims 5 and 7-10 respectively.
Claim(s) 6 and 16 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kaino as modified by Kishiwada and Go, and further in view of Zhou et al (CN 103900494 A - the attached English language translation is used hereinafter as the Official English language translation of this CN document). The teachings of Kaino as modified by Kishiwada and Go have been discussed above.
Re Claim 6: However Kaino as modified by Kishiwada and Go fails to explicitly disclose where Zhou discloses wherein each feature of the binary state random pattern is associated with an elongated line orientation having at least one of: vertical elongated features and horizontal elongated features (see Zhou, [0054]).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to further modify Kaino’s apparatus/method, as modified by Kishiwada and Go, using Zhou’s teachings by including the binary random pattern elongated vertical and horizontal features to Kaino’s [as modified by Kishiwada and Go] binary random pattern in order to improve the recognition of the random pattern for fast matching (see Zhou, [0054]).
As to claim 16, the discussions are addressed with regard to claim 6 respectively.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any extension fee pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to BERNARD KRASNIC whose telephone number is (571)270-1357. The examiner can normally be reached on Mon. - Thur. and every other Friday from 8am - 4pm.
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/Bernard Krasnic/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2671 October 6, 2025