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 Status
Applicant’s response filed 07 Jan 2026 amends claims 1, 3-8, 10-15, 17, 22, and 31-33; cancelled claims 2, 9, 16, 18-21, and 23-30; thereby providing claims 1, 3-8, 10-15, 17, 22, and 31-33 pending.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 15 Jun 2026have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
Applicant argues Budagavi fails to mention either "resampling" or an "out-of-loop post-filter" under the reasoning that “Budagavi's FIG. 4, ALF is performed "in the embedded decoder" as part of an in-loop process to generate reference data for future temporal prediction. In addition, those of ordinary skill know that ALF is, by definition, a loop filter, and that it doesn't make sense to apply ALF out-of-loop.” (Remarks, 2).
However, Budagavi describes in paragraph [0048] a post filter as “. . . The deblock filter component 316 filters the reconstructed picture information to alleviate blocking artifacts cased by the block-based video coding. The deblocking filter component 316 may, for example, adaptively apply low-pass filters to block boundaries according to the boundary strength. The filtered reference data is provided to the deblocked pixel storage component 340.). That is, Budagavi describes an out-of-loop post-filter. Accordingly, Applicant’s admitted prior art of HEVC standards teaches the amended limitation.
In addition Samuelsson teaches claimed applying the resampling out-of-loop post-filter on the decoded picture responsive to the information set in paragraph [0401] discussing “Adaptive Resolution Change (ARC) refers to a resolution change of pictures within a CVS . . . . That is, ARC provides where the resolution of a stored reference picture may be different from that of the current picture. A current picture may decoded using prediction from a reference picture that is generated by downscaling and/or downsampling a stored reference picture (i.e., the stored reference picture is larger in resolution than the current picture resolution) or upscaling and/or upsampling a stored reference picture (the stored reference picture is smaller in resolution than the current picture resolution).
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 1-17, 22, 23, and 31 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Budagavi (US 2012/0177104) in view of Samuelsson (US 2022/0272378) and Applicant’s Admitted Prior Art.
For claim 1, Budagavi discloses a method comprising:
decoding a picture of a plurality of pictures representing a video sequence from video data;
obtaining parameters of a out-of-loop filter determined from an information set associated to the video data ([0066] e.g Adaptive loop filtering is then applied 1606 to each LCU 1608 of the picture according to the filter type and set(s) of filter coefficients after the LCU is decoded 1602 and deblocking filtering is applied),
the information set comprising at least one first information specifying a condition to apply the filter ([0066] e.g. In some embodiments, the predefined set of adaptive loop filter types contains only one filter type. In such embodiments, the indication of the filter type is not decoded and the filter type is not selected.)
applying the out-of-loop filter on the decoded picture responsive to the information set ([0063] The deblocking loop filter component 416 smoothes artifacts created by the block nature of the encoding process to improve the visual quality of the decoded picture.).
While Budagavi discloses [0055] “the amount of storage needed to retain the rows of unfiltered pixels and the additional rows of pixels needed for filter application depends on the maximum vertical filter size and the maximum picture width,” Budagavi does not expressly disclose the information set comprising at least one first information specifying a condition to apply the resampling out-of-loop post-filter based on a second information representing a dimension of the picture;
Samuelsson teaches the information set comprising at least one first information specifying a condition to apply ([0571] 1. Signal in slice a flag if the current picture shall be stored twice in the DPB with different resolutions).
the resampling out-of-loop post-filter ([0572] Specify simple fixed resampling filters that provide good performance for the 1:2 and 2:1 scaling case.)
based on a second information representing a dimension of the picture ([0573] . . . coded resolution and resolution after resampling must be in the range of [¼, 1] relative the width and height signalled in SPS. [0401] Adaptive Resolution Change (ARC) refers to a resolution change of pictures within a CVS. It should be noted that Adaptive Resolution Change may some instances be referred to as Reference Picture Resampling (RRR). As such, although the term ARC is used in this document, it may, in some cases, be used interchangeably with the term RRR or some other equivalent term. That is, ARC provides where the resolution of a stored reference picture may be different from that of the current picture. A current picture may decoded using prediction from a reference picture that is generated by downscaling and/or downsampling a stored reference picture (i.e., the stored reference picture is larger in resolution than the current picture resolution) or upscaling and/or upsampling a stored reference picture (the stored reference picture is smaller in resolution than the current picture resolution).
It would be obvious to a person with ordinary skill in the art to combine the resampling out-of-loop post-filter teachings of Budagavi with the dimension teachings of Samuelsson for the predictable benefit to reduce aliasing artifacts.
Examiner notes the claimed limitation of obtaining parameters of a resampling out-of-loop post-filter is discussed as Applicant’s Admitted Prior Art in Specification [0003] which discussesobtaining parameters of a resampling out-of-loop post-filter ([0003] . . . For instance, Supplemental enhanced information (SEI) messages were defined to convey some post-filtering parameters.). It would be obvious to a person with ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of HEVC, etc standards for the predictable benefit of complying with established coding standards.
For claim 3, while Budagavi does not, Samuelsson teaches wherein the resampling out-of-loop post-filter is a separable resampling out-of-loop post-filter and the parameters obtained from the information set specifies parameters of a horizontal resampling out-of-loop post-filter and parameters of a vertical resampling out-of-loop post-filter ([0483] Where scale_fp is the fixed-point scaling factor for the respective direction (horizontal or vertical)). It would be obvious to a person with ordinary skill in the art to combine the resampling out-of-loop post-filter teachings of Budagavi with the dimension teachings of Samuelsson for the same reasons discussed for claim 1.
For claim 4, while Budagavi does not, Samuelsson teaches wherein the resampling out-of-loop post-filter is intended to be applied to luma and chroma components of each picture of the subset of pictures and the parameters obtained from the information set specifies parameters of the resampling out-of-loop post-filter adapted for the resampling out-of-loop post-filtering of the luma component and parameters of the resampling out-of-loop post-filter adapted for the resampling out-of-loop post-filtering of the chroma components different from the parameters of the resampling out-of-loop post-filter adapted for the resampling out-of-loop post-filtering of the luma components( [0100] The prediction luma sample value predSamplesLX[xL][yL] is derived by invoking the luma sample 8-tap interpolation resampling out-of-loop post-filtering process as specified in below with (xIntL, yIntL), (xFracL, yFracL) --- [0111] The prediction sample value predSamplesLX[xC][yC] is derived by invoking the chroma sample interpolation process specified below with (xIntC, yIntC), (xFracC, yFracC), refPicLX, and padVal as inputs.). It would be obvious to a person with ordinary skill in the art to combine the resampling out-of-loop post-filter teachings of Budagavi with the dimension teachings of Samuelsson for the same reasons discussed for claim 1.
For claim 5, while Budagavi does not, Samuelsson teaches wherein the at least one first information specifies that the resampling out-of-loop post-filter is applied only to pictures that have a resolution different from a maximum resolution specified for the video sequence by a high-level syntax element ([0402] There have been several different proposals to add support for ARC in VVC. One example proposal is Chen et al., “AHG 19: Adaptive Resolution Change”, JVET-N0279, March 2019, referred to herein as Chen, which describes signaling adaptive resolution change in parameter sets and modifications to the current motion compensated prediction process when there is a resolution change between a current picture and its reference pictures --- [0417] The techniques for enabling ARC provided in Chen may be less than ideal. In particular, according to the techniques in Chen, when a current picture uses a different lower resolution compared to a reference picture, the reference picture is downscaled from a higher resolution stored reference picture, the resulting image quality may be less than ideal. That is, when the techniques provided in Chen are utilized with the motion interpolation resampling out-of-loop post-filters provided in JVET-N1001, described above, severe aliasing artifacts may occur, particularly, in cases of relatively large scaling ratios. This disclosure describes examples of resampling out-of-loop post-filters with low-pass characteristics that may be used for ARC use cases where a reference picture is larger than a current picture. Further, the signaling of ARC parameters in Chen may be less than ideal. This disclosure describes examples of techniques for signaling ARC parameters. It should be noted that the example techniques described herein may be utilized for approaches of ARC including scaling without the resampling of reference pictures and/or approaches of ARC where a new reference picture is created from a reference picture with different resolution.). It would be obvious to a person with ordinary skill in the art to combine the resampling out-of-loop post-filter teachings of Budagavi with the dimension teachings of Samuelsson for the same reasons discussed for claim 1.
For claim 6, while Budagavi does not, Samuelsson teaches wherein the information set comprises a third information specifying a resampling out-of-loop post-filtering method in a plurality of resampling out-of-loop post-filtering methods ([0624] In one example, the method, wherein the motion compensation interpolation resampling out-of-loop post-filter is selected as an integer version of a Lanczos resampling out-of-loop post-filter for scaling factor 1.5:1 with cut-off frequency of 0.95a. [0625] In one example, the method, wherein interpolation resampling out-of-loop post-filter coefficients [−1, −5, 17, 42, 17, −5, −1, 0] correspond to a fractional sample position 0. [0626] In one example, the method, wherein selecting the motion compensation interpolation resampling out-of-loop post-filter based on a value of the scaling factor includes selecting the motion compensation interpolation resampling out-of-loop post-filter when the scaling factor is greater than 1.3. [0627] In one example, the method, wherein selecting the motion compensation interpolation resampling out-of-loop post-filter based on a value of the scaling factor includes selecting the motion compensation interpolation resampling out-of-loop post-filter when the scaling factor is less than 1.8.). It would be obvious to a person with ordinary skill in the art to combine the resampling out-of-loop post-filter teachings of Budagavi with the dimension teachings of Samuelsson for the same reasons discussed for claim 1.
For claim 7, while Budagavi does not, Samuelsson teaches wherein the plurality of resampling out-of-loop post-filtering methods comprises a luma resampling out-of-loop post-filtering, a chroma resampling out-of-loop post-filtering, a bilinear resampling out-of-loop post-filtering, a Directional Cubic Convolution Interpolation, an Iterative Curvature-based Interpolation, a Edge-Guided Image Interpolation, and a deep learning based resampling out-of-loop post-filtering method ([0484] Resampling out-of-loop post-filter unit 216 may be configured to perform deblocking, Sample Adaptive Offset (SAO) resampling out-of-loop post-filtering, Adaptively Loop Resampling out-of-loop post-filtering (ALF), etc. SAO resampling out-of-loop post-filtering is a non-linear amplitude mapping that may be used to improve reconstruction by adding an offset to reconstructed video data.). It would be obvious to a person with ordinary skill in the art to combine the resampling out-of-loop post-filter teachings of Budagavi with the dimension teachings of Samuelsson for the same reasons discussed for claim 1.
Claims 8, 9-15, 17, 22, 23, and 31-33, are disclosed by Budagavi and Samuelsson as discussed for corresponding limitations in claim 1, and 3-7.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
CHOI; Byeongdoo et al. US 20210306626 A1 METHOD FOR SIGNALING VIRTUAL BOUNDARY SIGNALING WITH SUBPICTURES IN CODED VIDEO STREAM
Cote; Guy et al. US 20200351460 A1 Raw Scaler With Chromatic Aberration Correction
Ye; Yan et al. US 20180020225 A1 METHODS, APPARATUS AND SYSTEMS FOR SCALABLE VIDEO CODING WITH MIXED INTERLACE AND PROGRESSIVE CONTENT
Van Belle; Ronny US 20160295158 A1 METHOD AND PROCESSOR FOR STREAMING VIDEO PROCESSING
Lim; Suk Hwan et al. US 20170061576 A1 APPLYING CHROMA SUPPRESSION TO IMAGE DATA IN A SCALER OF AN IMAGE PROCESSING PIPELINE
Budagavi; Madhukar et al. US 20120177104 A1 Reduced Complexity Adaptive Loop Resampling out-of-loop post-filter (ALF) for Video Coding
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 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.
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/NEIL R MIKESKA/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2485
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