Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
1. The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Response to Arguments
2. Applicant's arguments filed 03/10/2026 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
On pages 5-8 of Applicant’s remarks, Applicant argued that Wenger does not disclose rescaling as part of decoding pixel values forming a first and second motion compensation predictor using the first and second scale factors as claimed; in addition, Applicant stated that each of these rescaling operations clearly occur after video decoder 603 decodes and reconstructs the coded pictures in the bitstream.
However, the Examiner respectfully disagrees. Wenger clearly teaches in paragraph 0078 that the decoded picture buffer (604) stores reference pictures or segments in full resolution, a rescaling (605) may be required to provide the decoder (603) with an appropriately resampled reference picture. Therefore, the video decoder 603 may perform motion compensated predictive coding (as taught in paragraphs 0038 and 0049), using scale factors (as shown in FIG. 6, scaling parameters are used in generating resampled reference picture). Thus, the rescaling operations can also occur before the video decoder 603 decodes and reconstructs the coded pictures in the bitstream.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
3. 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.
4. The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
5. Claim(s) 9 and 16 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wenger et al. (US 2020/0213605) hereinafter “Wenger” in view of LI et al. (US 2022/0078420) hereinafter “LI”.
As per claim 9, Wenger discloses a video decoder (fig. 6) configured to:
selectively operate in a mode for generating a motion compensation predictor for a current picture having a first resolution different from a reference picture having a second resolution (paragraph 0064, a flag (e.g., adaptive picture resolution) (502) may indicate whether the spatial resolution of a picture segment (e.g. tile, tile group, CTU, CTU group) may be adaptively resampled/rescaled/unscaled (the three terms are used interchangeably throughout) for decoding, referencing for prediction, and output for display (collectively RPR information). If said flags indicates the presence of RPR information, certain syntax elements can indicate the picture size of reference pictures and output pictures, respectively; see fig. 7), the mode utilizing a spatial resolution changing scale factor (resolution ratio or resampling factors, as taught in paragraphs 0071-0072, 0074-0075 and 0103, are related to spatial resolution as taught in paragraph 0064) and a filter (paragraph 0079);
receive a bit stream including a current coded picture having a first resolution and signaling information (paragraph 0078, a video bitstream parser (602) may parse and interpret the above syntax elements and other syntax elements from a coded video bitstream received from a coded picture buffer (601). A video decoder, in receipt of non-RPS related syntax elements from the coded video bitstream may reconstruct the coded picture in potentially downsampled resolution, wherein the bitstream includes coded pictures as shown in fig. 4 and taught in paragraph 0047), the current coded picture including a first coding unit and a second coding unit (fig. 7; paragraphs 0081-0086);
the signaling information including first information for determining a first spatial resolution changing scale factor and second information useful for determining a second spatial resolution changing scale factor (such as reference_pic_width_in_luma_samples reference_pic_height_in_luma_samples, decoded_pic_width_in_luma_samples, decoded_pic_height_in_luma_samples shown in fig. 5; paragraphs 0070-0072); and
decode the current picture in the first resolution (paragraph 0078, A video decoder, in receipt of non-RPS related syntax elements from the coded video bitstream may reconstruct the coded picture in potentially downsampled resolution), the decode comprising:
determine, using the first information, the first spatial resolution changing scale factor (ratio or resolution ratio for a tile is determined based on a relation between reference picture resolution and decoded picture resolution signaled in the syntax elements; see fig. 5 and paragraphs 0070-0071), the first scale factor being associated with the first coding unit (such as tile 1 in fig. 7; paragraph 0069 teaches that RPR techniques can be applied per tile base);
using the mode, decode the pixel values of the first coding unit by forming a first motion compensation predictor using the first scale factor (paragraph 0078 that the decoded picture buffer (604) stores reference pictures or segments in full resolution, a rescaling (605) may be required to provide the decoder (603) with an appropriately resampled reference picture. Paragraph 0038 also teaches that the output samples of the scaler/inverse transform unit (351) can pertain to an inter coded, and potentially motion compensated block. In such a case, a Motion Compensation Prediction unit (353) can access reference picture memory (357) to fetch samples used for prediction. After motion compensating the fetched samples in accordance with the symbols (321) pertaining to the block, these samples can be added by the aggregator (355) to the output of the scaler/inverse transform unit (in this case called the residual samples or residual signal) so to generate output sample information; in addition, RPR techniques are used by the decoder of fig. 6 to reconstruct coded pictures, see fig. 6; said RPR techniques can be applied per tile basis as taught in paragraph 0069 and shown in fig. 7. In addition, it is inherited that the decoder comprises an intra-picture predictor or inter-picture predictor with motion compensation for generating prediction blocks that will be added to the residual blocks to reconstruct picture data, as shown in fig. 3 and paragraphs 0003 and 0038. Furthermore, paragraph 0091 teaches that the claimed decoding method with RPR process can be performed by the decoder 210, which includes motion compensation prediction 353 for generating prediction blocks for each tile of the input picture, such as tile 1 and tile 3 of input picture 701, said prediction blocks will be added to the residual blocks to reconstruct picture data);
store the decoded pixel values of the first coding unit in a buffer (see decoded picture buffer 604 in FIG. 6; paragraph 0078, the decoded picture buffer (604) stores reference pictures or segments in full resolution; see also paragraph 0079);
determine using the second information, the second spatial resolution changing scale factor (ratio or resolution ratio for a tile is determined based on a relation between reference picture resolution and decoded picture resolution signaled in the syntax elements; see fig. 5 and paragraphs 0070-0071), the second scale factor being associated with the second coding unit (such as tile 3 in fig. 7; paragraph 0069 teaches that RPR techniques can be applied per tile base), the first and second scale factors having different values (decoded tiles 1 and 3 as shown in fig. 7 have different values for decoded_pic_width_in_luma_samples and decoded_pic_height_in_luma_samples; therefore their resolution ratios are different);
using the mode, decode the pixel values of the second coding unit by forming a second motion compensation predictor using the second scale factor (paragraph 0078 that the decoded picture buffer (604) stores reference pictures or segments in full resolution, a rescaling (605) may be required to provide the decoder (603) with an appropriately resampled reference picture. Paragraph 0038 also teaches that the output samples of the scaler/inverse transform unit (351) can pertain to an inter coded, and potentially motion compensated block. In such a case, a Motion Compensation Prediction unit (353) can access reference picture memory (357) to fetch samples used for prediction. After motion compensating the fetched samples in accordance with the symbols (321) pertaining to the block, these samples can be added by the aggregator (355) to the output of the scaler/inverse transform unit (in this case called the residual samples or residual signal) so to generate output sample information; in addition, RPR techniques are used by the decoder of fig. 6 to reconstruct coded pictures, see fig. 6; said RPR techniques can be applied per tile basis as taught in paragraph 0069 and shown in fig. 7. In addition, it is inherited that the decoder comprises an intra-picture predictor or inter-picture predictor with motion compensation for generating prediction blocks that will be added to the residual blocks to reconstruct picture data, as shown in fig. 3 and paragraphs 0003 and 0038. Furthermore, paragraph 0091 teaches that the claimed decoding method with RPR process can be performed by the decoder 210, which includes motion compensation prediction 353 for generating prediction blocks for each tile of the input picture, such as tile 1 and tile 3 of input picture 701, said prediction blocks will be added to the residual blocks to reconstruct picture data); and
store the decoded pixel values of the second coding unit in the buffer (see decoded picture buffer 604 in FIG. 6; paragraph 0078, the decoded picture buffer (604) stores reference pictures or segments in full resolution; see also paragraph 0079), whereby after decoding, including after using the first scale factor and second scale factor to form predictors for the first and second coding units, the decoded current coded picture remains in the first resolution (paragraph 0089, In this example, the reference picture buffer keeps the reference picture samples at full resolution, which in this case is the same as the source resolution. Accordingly, the four rescaled tiles for reference (706 through 709) may be kept at 2H and 2 W resolution, respectively. In order to match the varying resolutions of the decoded tiles (702 through 705), the rescaling (710) in both directions from decoder to reference picture buffer and in reverse, can be different for each tile; see also FIG. 7).
While Wenger does not explicitly teach a picture segment as a coding unit, on the other hand, LI discloses that picture segment is considered a coding unit (paragraph 0061, a “picture” generally refers to a unit representing one image in a specific time period, and a slice/tile is a coding unit constituting a part of a picture).
One of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, would have been motivated to combine the elements taught by Wenger, with those of LI, because both references are drawn to the same field of endeavor, because indeed both references are related to decoding process using reference frames, and because such a combination represents a mere combination of prior art elements, according to known methods, to yield a predictable result.
As per claim 16, Wenger discloses wherein the first coding unit is NxN and N is one of 16, 32, 64, 128, and the second coding unit is MxM and M is one of 16, 32, 64,128 (paragraph 0061, Source pictures commonly may be subdivided spatially into a plurality of sample blocks (for example, blocks of 4×4, 8×8, 4×8, or 16×16 samples each)).
Conclusion
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. 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 nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) 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 mailing date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MOHAMMED JEBARI whose telephone number is (571)270-7945. The examiner can normally be reached on M-F: 09:00am-06:00pm.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Chris Kelley can be reached on 571-272-7331. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/MOHAMMED JEBARI/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2482
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