DETAILED ACTION
This action is responsive to the Amendments and Remarks received 05/25/2026 in which claims 1–17 and 22 are cancelled, claims 18, 25, and 32 are amended, and no claims are added as new claims.
Response to Arguments
On pages 6–7 of the Remarks, Applicant contends the cited prior art fails to teach or suggest the features added by way of amendment. Examiner disagrees. Regarding the feature drawn to the GPM merge list being the basis for generating the inter-prediction for the multi-hypothesis coding mode, Examiner finds the combination of Galpin and Wang are sufficient to teach the recited feature for the reasons stated, infra, for the rejection of independent claim. Indeed, as demonstrated in the prior art of record, the similarity between the approaches teaches or suggests their combination in the manner claimed. Regarding the feature that a motion vector refinement process includes bilateral matching, the rejection, infra, explains that the skilled artisan understood that for inter-prediction candidates, it was known to refine those motion candidates using bilateral matching. Therefore, because the prior art teaches or suggests Applicant’s claimed features, the claims are unpatentable as obvious under 35 U.S.C. 103.
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 of this title, 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 18–21 and 23–38 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Galpin (US 2022/0014778 A1), Wang (EP 4,243,419 B1), and Panusopone (US 2023/0144567 A1).
Regarding claim 18, the combination of Galpin, Wang, and Panusopone teaches or suggests a method for video processing, comprising: determining, during a conversion between a target video block of a video and a bitstream of the video, a geometric partitioning mode (GPM) merge list for the target video block, the GPM merge list comprising a plurality of motion candidates (Galpin, ¶ 0116: teaches the MHP uni-prediction candidates can be derived in the same manner as the triangle merge list; Examiner notes GPM and triangle mode are synonymous in the art wherein the triangle mode is just a case where the line is exactly diagonal and other sloped lines make wedge or trapezoid shapes; Wang, ¶ 0059: teaches a “uni-prediction candidate list may comprise one or more candidates, and each candidate may be a motion vector”; Wang, ¶ 0108: teaches triangle mode and geometric partitioning are generally the same prediction mode wherein triangle mode just means the diagonal partitioning line is exactly diagonal with respect to the block and otherwise wedge or trapezoid shapes are created by a non-exact diagonal partition line); applying a multi-hypothesis prediction process for the target video block based on the GPM merge list; and performing the conversion based on a result of the multi-hypothesis prediction process (Galpin, 0115: teaches multi-hypothesis coding wherein the motion candidate part (i.e. inter part) of the coding mode is derived from a uni-prediction merge list that is different from the regular merge list; Galpin, ¶ 0116: teaches the MHP uni-prediction candidates can be derived in the same manner as the triangle merge list), wherein a refinement process is applied during the multi-hypothesis prediction process (Wang, ¶ 0092: teaches the uni-directional motion vector merge candidate can include an offset, which the skilled artisan equates with a refinement; Panusopone, ¶ 0072: teaches motion vector refinement by applying offsets for geometric prediction), wherein applying the multi-hypothesis prediction process comprises: generating a plurality of hypothetic uni-predictors for the target video block based on the GPM merge list (Galpin, 0115: teaches multi-hypothesis coding wherein the motion candidate part (i.e. inter part) of the coding mode is derived from a uni-prediction merge list that is different from the regular merge list; Galpin, ¶ 0116: teaches the MHP uni-prediction candidates can be derived in the same manner as the triangle merge list; Examiner notes GPM and triangle mode are synonymous in the art wherein the triangle mode is just a case where the line is exactly diagonal and other sloped lines make wedge or trapezoid shapes), and wherein the refinement process is based on bilateral matching (Examiner notes that bilateral matching is a decoder-side motion vector refinement technique (DMVR); Panusopone, ¶ 0028: teaches DMVR is a coding tool used for inter-picture prediction; Used as a dictionary reference only, Chen (US 2020/0169748 A1), para. [0050] explains, “Bilateral matching is a variant of DMVR techniques…[and] computes the bilateral matching cost directly between the uni-prediction reference blocks.”).
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 Galpin, with those of Wang, because both references are drawn to the same field of endeavor such that one wishing to practice motion vector merge candidate list construction for GPM and MHP would be led to their relevant teachings and because combining Galpin’s recognition that the triangle mode uni-prediction merge list is like the MHP uni-prediction merge list with Wang’s realization of the same fact amounts to a mere combination of prior art elements, according to known methods, to yield a predictable result. This rationale applies to all combinations of Galpin and Wang used in this Office Action unless otherwise noted.
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 Galpin and Wang, with those of Panusopone, because all three references are drawn to the same field of endeavor such that one wishing to practice motion vector merge candidate list construction for GPM and MHP would be led to their relevant teachings and because combining Galpin’s geometric partitioning merge mode or Wang’s motion vector plus offset (Wang, ¶ 0092) with Panusopone’s geometric partitioning merge mode (Panusopone, e.g. ¶ 0064) to additionally include motion vector refinement using MV offsets for each GEO partition (Panusopone, ¶ 0072) amounts to a mere combination of prior art elements, according to known methods, to yield a predictable result. This rationale applies to all combinations of Galpin, Wang, and Panusopone used in this Office Action unless otherwise noted.
Regarding claim 19, the combination of Galpin, Wang, and Panusopone teaches or suggests the method of claim 18, wherein derivation of a plurality of hypothetic predictions in the multi-hypothesis prediction process is based on a construction process of the GPM merge list (Galpin, Abstract: teaches multi-hypothesis prediction is based on a motion vector list construction process; Galpin, ¶ 0116: teaches the MHP uni-prediction candidates can be derived in the same manner as the triangle merge list; Examiner notes GPM and triangle mode are synonymous in the art wherein the triangle mode is just a case where the line is exactly diagonal and other sloped lines make wedge or trapezoid shapes; Wang, ¶ 0059: teaches a “uni-prediction candidate list may comprise one or more candidates, and each candidate may be a motion vector”; Wang, ¶ 0108: teaches triangle mode and geometric partitioning are generally the same prediction mode wherein triangle mode just means the diagonal partitioning line is exactly diagonal with respect to the block and otherwise wedge or trapezoid shapes are created by a non-exact diagonal partition line).
Regarding claim 20, the combination of Galpin, Wang, and Panusopone teaches or suggests the method of claim 18, wherein applying the multi-hypothesis prediction process comprises: generating a plurality of hypothetic predictions for the target video block based on the GPM merge list (Galpin, 0115: teaches multi-hypothesis coding wherein the motion candidate part (i.e. inter part) of the coding mode is derived from a uni-prediction merge list that is different from the regular merge list; Galpin, ¶ 0116: teaches the MHP uni prediction candidates can be shared with the GPM merge list).
Regarding claim 21, the combination of Galpin, Wang, and Panusopone teaches or suggests the method of claim 18, wherein the GPM merge list is different from a further merge list (Galpin, 0115: teaches multi-hypothesis coding wherein the motion candidate part (i.e. inter part) of the coding mode is derived from a uni-prediction merge list that is different from the regular merge list; see also Wang, ¶ 0063: teaching the different procedure for triangle merge candidate list construction and regular merge candidate list construction).
Regarding claim 23, the combination of Galpin, Wang, and Panusopone teaches or suggests the method of claim 18, wherein the conversion comprises encoding the target video block into the bitstream (Galpin, Abstract: teaches the multi-hypothesis prediction with weights is for efficient encoding).
Regarding claim 24, the combination of Galpin, Wang, and Panusopone teaches or suggests the method of claim 18, wherein the conversion comprises decoding the target video block from the bitstream (Galpin, Abstract: teaches the multi-hypothesis prediction with weights is for efficient decoding).
Claim 25 lists the same elements as claim 18, but in apparatus form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 18 applies to the instant claim.
Claim 26 lists the same elements as claim 19, but in apparatus form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 19 applies to the instant claim.
Claim 27 lists the same elements as claim 20, but in apparatus form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 20 applies to the instant claim.
Claim 28 lists the same elements as claim 21, but in apparatus form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 21 applies to the instant claim.
Claim 29 lists the same elements as claim 22, but in apparatus form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 22 applies to the instant claim.
Claim 30 lists the same elements as claim 23, but in apparatus form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 23 applies to the instant claim.
Claim 31 lists the same elements as claim 24, but in apparatus form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 24 applies to the instant claim.
Claim 32 lists the same elements as claim 18, but in CRM form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 18 applies to the instant claim.
Claim 33 lists the same elements as claim 19, but in CRM form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 19 applies to the instant claim.
Claim 34 lists the same elements as claim 20, but in CRM form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 20 applies to the instant claim.
Claim 35 lists the same elements as claim 21, but in CRM form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 21 applies to the instant claim.
Claim 36 lists the same elements as claim 22, but in CRM form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 22 applies to the instant claim.
Claim 37 lists the same elements as claims 23 and 24, but in CRM form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejections of claims 23 and 24 apply to the instant claim.
Regarding claim 38, the combination of Galpin, Wang, and Panusopone teaches or suggests the method of claim 18, further comprising: storing the bitstream in a non-transitory computer-readable recording medium (Galpin, ¶ 0043).
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Lee et al., “CE4-related: CIIP Simplification,” JVET-O0384, 15th Meeting: Gothenburg, SE, July 2019.
Chen et al., “Joint Inter-Intra Prediction Based on Mode-Variant and Edge-Directed Weighting Approaches in Video Coding, “IEEE International Conference on Acoustic, Speech and Signal Processing (ICASSP), 2014.
Cha et al., “Improved Combined Inter-Intra Prediction Using Spatial-Variant Weighted Coefficient,” 2011.
Chiang et al., “CE10.1.1: Multi-hypothesis prediction for improving AMVP mode, skip or merge mode, and intra mode,” JVET-L0100-v3, 12th Meeting: Macao, CN, October 2018.
Wang (EP 4,243,419 B1) teaches a “uni-prediction candidate list may comprise one or more candidates, and each candidate may be a motion vector” (¶ 0059) and teaches triangle mode and geometric partitioning are generally the same prediction mode wherein triangle mode just means the diagonal partitioning line is exactly diagonal with respect to the block and otherwise wedge or trapezoid shapes are created by a non-exact diagonal partition line (¶ 0108).
Chiu (US 2021/0227206 A1) teaches GPM merge candidate lists and regular merge candidate lists (e.g. ¶ 0051).
Chen (US 2021/0160528 A1) teaches triangle and GPM prediction may be considered in the same breath and may use the same or similar approaches as CIIP (i.e. multi-hypothesis) (e.g. ¶¶ 0011, 0184, 0206, 0226).
Chen (US 2020/0169748 A1) teaches, “Bilateral matching is a variant of DMVR techniques…[and] computes the bilateral matching cost directly between the uni-prediction reference blocks.” (¶ 0050).
Lin (US 2022/0150507 A1) teaches “bilateral matching based decoder side motion vector refinement (¶ 0022).
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 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 mailing date of this final action.
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/MICHAEL J HESS/Examiner, Art Unit 2481
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