DETAILED ACTION
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 .
This is in response to Applicant’s Request for Continued Examination (RCE) filed on 3/9/2026 with amendments and remarks filed on 2/17/2026. Claims 1-3, 5, 11-14, and 20 have been amended. Claims 1-20 are present for examination.
The 35 USC 112(b) rejections have been withdrawn in view of the amendments.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claim(s) 1 regarding 35 USC 103 rejection have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
Claim Objections
Claim 12 is objected to because of the following informalities: “computed as as” should be “computed as”. Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
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, 8, 9, 11, 18, and 20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over AAPA (Applicant Admitted Prior Art) in view of US 20170345204 A1 to Berechet et al. and Burley (Burley et al., The Design and Evolution of Disney’s Hyperion Renderer).
Regarding claim 1, AAPA discloses A computer-implemented method for rendering a volumetric medium (AAPA, Specification, para. [0003], disclosing volumetric rendering using null-collision approaches), the method comprising:
generating, in a first rendering pass, a first set of pixel values associated with rendering the volumetric medium using a first upper bound on a density of the volumetric medium (AAPA, Specification, para. [0002], disclosing volumetric rendering as the process of generating images for a 3D volumetric medium, para. [0003], disclosing null-collision approaches for performing volumetric rendering that determine absorption, emission, scattering, and/or other interactions between light and matter using predefined upper bounds (also referred to as majorants or bounding extinctions) on the density of the volumetric media at various points or regions in the 3D volume);
computing a second upper bound on the density of the volumetric medium based on a real density evaluated at a location within the volumetric medium (AAPA, Specification, para. [0002], disclosing volumetric rendering as the process of generating images for a 3D volumetric medium, para. [0003], disclosing null-collision approaches for performing volumetric rendering that determine absorption, emission, scattering, and/or other interactions between light and matter using predefined upper bounds (also referred to as majorants or bounding extinctions) on the density of the volumetric media at various points or regions in the 3D volume, para. [0004], disclosing evaluating the density at specific points within the volumetric medium, and the point-based estimates could be used to compute tight upper bounds on the density of the procedurally generated volumetric medium at corresponding locations or regions within the volumetric medium, and as the granularity of the grid increases, the accuracy and quality of the rendering improves, the increasing the granularity of the grid will compute a second upper bound with additional point-based estimates as a real density evaluated at a location within the volumetric medium);
generating, in a second rendering pass, a second set of pixel values associated with rendering the volumetric medium using the second upper bound on the density of the volumetric medium (AAPA, Specification, para. [0002], disclosing volumetric rendering as the process of generating images for a 3D volumetric medium, para. [0003], disclosing null-collision approaches for performing volumetric rendering that determine absorption, emission, scattering, and/or other interactions between light and matter using predefined upper bounds (also referred to as majorants or bounding extinctions) on the density of the volumetric media at various points or regions in the 3D volume, para. [0004], disclosing evaluating the density at specific points within the volumetric medium, and the point-based estimates could be used to compute tight upper bounds on the density of the procedurally generated volumetric medium at corresponding locations or regions within the volumetric medium, and as the granularity of the grid increases, the accuracy and quality of the rendering improves, the improvement of rendering of the accuracy and quality indicating the rendering under the increased grid granularity can be a second rendering pass that generates pixels values using a second upper bound on the density that is different than the original grid granularity before the increase (as the granularity of the grid increases, the tight upper bound at the corresponding locations or regions at points along the grid can be different), and the rendering on the original grid granularity before the increase can correspond to the first rendering pass).
However, AAPA does not expressly disclose computing a second upper bound on the density of the volumetric medium based on the first upper bounds; generating a rendering of the volumetric medium based on the first set of pixel values and the second set of pixel values.
On the other hand, Berechet discloses computing a second upper bound on the density of the volumetric medium based on the first upper bounds and a real density evaluated at a location within the volumetric medium (Berechet, para. [0040], disclosing obtaining three-dimensional volume, para. [0041], disclosing all the voxels obtained are used with the associated intensity, para. [0044], disclosing visualizing the complex scene according to an intensity threshold determined by trial and error, paras. [0047]-[0050], disclosing the voxels are thresholded in terms of intensity as a function of the intensity threshold, generating from the voxel volume, by a process of intensity threshold optimization, each intensity being associated with a color: an optimized threshold, and identify an optimized 3D voxel volume based on the optimized threshold, indicating the trial and error process can include several iterations, a first iteration will determine a first intensity threshold as the first upper bound on the density of the volumetric medium, and a second iteration will determine a second intensity threshold as the second upper bound on the density of the volumetric medium based on the previous intensity threshold and the intensity of voxels in the 3D volume. The optimized threshold can also be considered as a second upper bound on the density of the volumetric medium computed based on threshold optimization, which will include the first upper bound and real density values evaluated at locations within the volumetric medium).
Before the invention was effectively filed, it would have been obvious for a person skilled in the art to combine AAPA and Berechet. The suggestion would have been to improve object identification of the scene, as suggested by Berechet (see Berechet, para. [0069]).
However, AAPA or Berechet does not expressly disclose generating a rendering of the volumetric medium based on the first set of pixel values and the second set of pixel values.
On the other hand, Burley discloses generating a rendering of the volumetric medium based on the first set of pixel values and the second set of pixel values (Burley, p. 33:14, col. 1, 2nd para., disclosing denoiser that spatially and temporally filters the rendered images, 5th para., disclosing the denoiser does a weighted average of nearby pixels and adjacent frames, indicating the adjacent frames can correspond to a first set of pixel values and a second set of pixels values, and the denoising can correspond to generating a rendering of the scene based on the first set of pixels values and the second set of pixel values. Also, Burley discloses combining results from multiple rendering passes (see Burley, p. 33:17, col. 1, 2nd para)). Because AAPA discloses rendering of a volumetric medium to generate images, combining AAPA in view of Berechet and Burley could generate a rendering of the volumetric medium based on the first set of pixel values and the second set of pixel values.
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious for a person skilled in the art to combine AAPA in view of Berechet and Burley. The suggestion/motivation would have been to smooth away noise without blurring the image’s details, as suggested by Burley (see Burley, p. 33:14, col. 1, 2nd para.).
Regarding claim 8, the combination of AAPA, Berechet, and Burley discloses the computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the rendering is generated based on an average of the first set of pixel values and the second set of pixel values (Burley, p. 33:14, col. 1, 2nd para., disclosing denoiser that spatially and temporally filters the rendered images, 5th para., disclosing the denoiser does a weighted average of nearby pixels and adjacent frames, indicating the adjacent frames can correspond to a first set of pixel values and a second set of pixels values, and the denoising can correspond to generating a rendering of the scene based on the first set of pixels values and the second set of pixel values. Also, Burley discloses combining results from multiple rendering passes (see Burley, p. 33:17, col. 1, 2nd para)). Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious for a person skilled in the art to combine AAPA in view of Berechet and Burley. The suggestion/motivation would have been to smooth away noise without blurring the image’s details, as suggested by Burley (see Burley, p. 33:14, col. 1, 2nd para.).
Regarding claim 9, the combination of AAPA, Berechet, and Burley discloses the computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the first upper bound and the second upper bound are computed for a region within the volumetric medium (AAPA, Specification, para. [0002], disclosing volumetric rendering as the process of generating images for a 3D volumetric medium, para. [0003], disclosing null-collision approaches for performing volumetric rendering that determine absorption, emission, scattering, and/or other interactions between light and matter using predefined upper bounds (also referred to as majorants or bounding extinctions) on the density of the volumetric media at various points or regions in the 3D volume, para. [0004], disclosing evaluating the density at specific points within the volumetric medium, and the point-based estimates could be used to compute tight upper bounds on the density of the procedurally generated volumetric medium at corresponding locations or regions within the volumetric medium, and as the granularity of the grid increases, the accuracy and quality of the rendering improves, indicating the rendering with increasing grid granularity computes the upper bounds at corresponding locations/regions with the 3D volume of the volumetric medium).
Regarding claim 11, it recites similar limitations of claim of claim 1 but in one or more non-transitory computer-readable media form. The rationale of claim 1 rejection is applied to reject claim 11. In addition, AAPA is apparently run on a computer with one or more non-transitory computer-readable media because volumetric rendering as the process of generating images has to be run on a computer (see AAPA, Specification, para. [0002]). In addition, Burley discloses CPU and memory (see Burley, Fig. 14). Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious for a person skilled in the art to combine AAPA in view of Berechet and Burley. The suggestion/motivation would have been to smooth away noise without blurring the image’s details, as suggested by Burley (see Burley, p. 33:14, col. 1, 2nd para.).
Regarding claim 18, it recites similar limitations of claim of claim 9 but in one or more non-transitory computer-readable media form. The rationale of claim 9 rejection is applied to reject claim 18. In addition, AAPA is apparently run on a computer with one or more non-transitory computer-readable media because volumetric rendering as the process of generating images has to be run on a computer (see AAPA, Specification, para. [0002]). In addition, Burley discloses CPU and memory (see Burley, Fig. 14). Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious for a person skilled in the art to combine AAPA in view of Berechet and Burley. The suggestion/motivation would have been to smooth away noise without blurring the image’s details, as suggested by Burley (see Burley, p. 33:14, col. 1, 2nd para.).
Regarding claim 20, it recites similar limitations of claim of claim 1 but in a system form. The rationale of claim 1 rejection is applied to reject claim 20. In addition, AAPA is apparently run on a computer with one or more memories and one or more processors because volumetric rendering as the process of generating images has to be run on a computer (see AAPA, Specification, para. [0002]). In addition, Burley discloses CPU and memory (see Burley, Fig. 14). Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious for a person skilled in the art to combine AAPA in view of Berechet and Burley. The suggestion/motivation would have been to smooth away noise without blurring the image’s details, as suggested by Burley (see Burley, p. 33:14, col. 1, 2nd para.).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 2-7, 10, 12-17, and 19 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.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
Regarding claim 2, none of the prior art references on the record discloses determining a distance associated with a ray propagating within the volumetric medium based on the second bound and the real density evaluated at the location within the volumetric volume.
Regarding claim 3, none of the prior art references on the record discloses wherein the second upper bound is computed as a higher of (i) the first upper bound and (ii) a sum of the real density and a positive constant when the real density evaluated at the location within the volumetric medium from the first rendering pass is greater than the first upper bound.
Regarding claim 4, none of the prior art references on the record discloses generating, in a plurality of additional rendering passes, a plurality of additional sets of pixel values associated with rendering the volumetric medium, wherein each rendering pass included in the plurality of additional rendering passes is executed using a corresponding upper bound on the density of the volumetric medium that is equal to or higher than the second upper bound; and generating the rendering of the volumetric medium based on an aggregation of the plurality of additional sets of pixel values, the first set of pixel values, and the second set of pixel values.
Regarding claim 5, none of the prior art references on the record discloses computing a clamped real density of the volumetric medium based on the real density evaluated at the location within the volumetric medium and the first upper bound for the density of the volumetric medium; and generating the first set of pixel values based on the clamped real density of the volumetric medium.
Claims 6 and 7 depend from claim 5 with respective additional limitations.
Regarding claim 10, none of the prior art references on the record discloses wherein the first upper bound is lower than a set of sampled values for the density of the volumetric medium and the second upper bound is higher than or equal to the set of sampled values for the density of the volumetric medium.
Regarding claim 12, none of the prior art references on the record discloses wherein the second upper bound is computed as a maximum of (i) the first upper bound and (ii) a positive constant summed with the real density evaluated at the location within the volumetric medium.
Claim 13 recites similar limitations discussed above with respect to claim 5.
Claims 14 and 15 depend from claim 13 with respective additional limitations.
Claim 16 recites similar limitations discussed above with respect to claim 4.
Claim 17 depends from claim 16 with additional limitations.
Claim 19 recites similar limitations discussed above with respect to claim 10.
Conclusion
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/HAIXIA DU/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2611