Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
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.
Claims 1-2, 9-12, and 19-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhao et al. US 2019/0327463 (hereinafter “Zhao”) in view of Tang et al. CN 115423994 (hereinafter “Tang”, machine translation relied upon).
Regarding claim 1, Zhao discloses a vehicle based monitoring system (see paragraphs 0002 and 0024, unmanned aerial vehicles equipped with image devices are used for surveillance and tracking)
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, comprising: a vehicle, comprising a first image capture device, wherein the first image capture device captures a first image (see above paragraph 0024 a UAV with an image capturing device), wherein the vehicle extends a feedback interval of the first image in response to a first included angle feedback processing module and as described in paragraph 0101 the state of the transmitter may be used to determine the feedback transmission interval such as angle information or angular velocity information, when the angular velocity associated with a camera or UAV is less than a predetermined threshold then the difference between consecutive images may be small and the feedback interval may be lengthened [extended])
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, wherein the vehicle feedbacks the first image according to the feedback interval (see above paragraph 0101).
As discussed Zhao discloses that the feedback can be based on the state of the image capture device such as the angle, but does not go into specific details as to how the angle is determined, thus Zhao does not explicitly disclose that the angle is between a line of sight of the image capture device and a travel direction of the vehicle, although this is most likely the angle being referred to.
Tang discloses that the angle between the line of sight of an image capture device and the direction of movement can be obtained to ensure good image capturing position (see the second page).
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Zhao and Tang are analogous art because they are from the same field of endeavor of image capturing of a moving vehicle.
Before the effective filing date of the invention it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to determine the angle as alluded to by Zhao as the angle between the direction of movement and the line of sight of the camera as taught by Tang. The motivation would be to determine the angle of the image capturing based on the two important aspects of what is being captured.
Regarding claim 2, Zhao discloses the feedback interval is directly proportional to traveling speed of the vehicle (see above paragraph 0101, when the angular velocity associated with the camera is less than a threshold the feedback interval may be lengthened).
Regarding claim 9, Zhao discloses wherein the vehicle extends the feedback interval to a first time interval in response to traveling speed of the vehicle being greater than a speed threshold, wherein the vehicle extends the feedback interval to a second time interval in response to the traveling speed being less than or equal to the speed threshold, wherein the first time interval is greater than the second time interval (see above paragraph 0101 changing the feedback differently based on being above or inversely below the threshold).
Regarding claim 10, Zhao discloses that the vehicle is a drone (a UAV, see paragraph 0024).
Claims 11-12 are similarly analyzed to claims 1-2.
Claim 19 is similarly analyzed to claim 9.
Claim 20 is similarly analyzed to claim 1, note that Zhao discloses a UAV [drone].
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 3-8, 13-18 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Please see attached 892 notice of references cited.
Contact Information
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JOHN B STREGE whose telephone number is (571)272-7457. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9-5 (PST).
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/JOHN B STREGE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2669