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 .
Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 1/22/2026 has been entered.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to independent claims 1 and 11 have been fully considered but are moot because the arguments do not directly apply to the new combination of references being used in the current rejection.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-6, 8-10, 12-16 and 18-20 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:
The prior art of record, as a single reference or as a combination, fails to disclose all the limitations of claim 2 including:
in response to receiving a third user input to merge the first content and the second content, display a screen for merging the first content and the second content based on a picture-in-picture (PIP) layout, wherein the screen includes a timeline to simultaneously change the first content and the second content displayed in the screen; and
in response to identifying a first time section based on a fourth user input associated with the timeline, segment the first content and the second content based on the identified first time section.
The same reasoning applies to claim 12. Claims 3-6, 8-10, 13-16 and 18-20 depend from either claim 2 or claim 12.
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.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claims 1, 7, 11 and 17 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US 9953680 B2 to Kim et al. (hereinafter “Kim”) (cited in the IDS filed 01/27/2025) in view of US 20150179223 A1 to Leppanen et al. (“Leppanen”), further in view of US 20160044235 A1 to Cho et al. (“Cho”).
Consider claim 1, Kim discloses an electronic device comprising:
a display (fig. 1A-1B and col. 6 ln. 10-21: display unit 151);
memory including one or more storage media storing instructions (fig. 1A and col. 6 ln. 33-49: memory 170); and
at least one processor including processing circuitry, wherein the instructions, when executed by the at least one processor individually or collectively (fig. 1A and col. 6 ln. 49-62: controller 180 executing application program), cause the electronic device to:
receive a first user input for displaying a first content, based on metadata associated with the first content, identify whether a second content that was concurrently obtained with the first content exists (Col. 27 Ln. 14-31 and fig. 14: “a timeline 1400 of the first full video may be output in the camera preview mode after the completion of the video capturing … when a touch input is applied to the reproduction icon 1460, the first full video may be reproduced. In detail, the video captured by the first front camera may be reproduced on the first region 1410, the video captured by the second front camera may be reproduced on the second region 1420, and the video captured by the rear camera may be reproduced on the third region 1430, respectively”. Note, therefore the split-screen format of Fig. 14 shows/identifies concurrently captured content, which is based on the timing metadata because it is linked with the timeline 1400),
based on the second content that was concurrently obtained with the first content being identified using the metadata, display a visual object indicating that the second content was concurrently obtained with the first content, with the first content (Col. 27 Ln. 14-31 and fig. 14: as discussed above, the split-screen format serves as a visual object indicating concurrently captured content),
identify a second user input for editing the first content (Col. 30 Ln. 3-7 and Fig. 18: “a video clip 1820 corresponding to the first full video and a video clip 1820 corresponding to the second full video may be output in an enlarged manner. Also, edit icons 1040, 1050 and 1060 for editing the video clips may be output.”).
Kim fails to explicitly disclose:
based on the second user input being identified while the visual object is displayed with the first content, display a window to determine whether to display the first content and the second content as superimposed on the first content being displayed, and based on a third user input received through the window, display a screen for merging the first content and the second content.
In analogous art, Leppanen discloses:
based on the second user input being identified while the visual object is displayed with the first content, display a
It would have been obvious to one with ordinary skill, in the art before the effective filing date of the invention, to modify the teachings of Kim in view of the above teachings of Leppanen to improve ease of use when selecting among concurrently captured video portions to include in a composition (Leppanen, Par. [0134]).
While Leppanen teaches an icon instead of a window for the selection, Kim teaches a pop-up window for selecting editing effects (Col. 26 Ln. 1-7). It would have been an obvious design choice to one with ordinary skill, in the art before the effective filing date of the invention, to modify the teachings of modified Kim in view of the above teachings of Kim because the substitution of one known element (pop-up window) for another (icon) would have yielded predictable results to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the invention.
Leppanen further teaches an option for displaying a selectable thumbnail image of second content together with a first content (Par. [0134]), but does not explicitly teach the second content superimposed on the first content, or based on a third user input received through the window, display a screen for merging the first content and the second content.
In analogous art, Cho discloses the second content superimposed on the first content, and based on a third user input received through the window, display a screen for merging the first content and the second content (Par. [0184]-[0186]: “FIGS. 13A-13C are diagrams for one example of a process for creating a 3rd preview image using a 1st preview image and a 2nd preview image in a mobile terminal … if the 2nd preview image 1310 is dragged to the 1st preview image 1320, a 3rd preview image can be displayed using the 2nd preview image 1310 as a background [FIG. 13B]. On the other hand, if the 1st preview image 1320 is dragged to the 2nd preview image 1310, a 3rd preview image can be displayed using the 1st preview image 1320 as a background [FIG. 13C]”; also, Par. [0160] and Fig. 6 describe a user input for entering the multi-preview mode).
It would have been obvious to one with ordinary skill, in the art before the effective filing date of the invention, to modify the teachings of modified Kim further in view of the above teachings of Cho such that a user can create a single video file by conveniently selecting/changing a recording desired preview image (Cho: Par. [0157]).
Consider claim 7, modified Kim discloses the electronic device of claim 1, wherein the instructions, when executed by the at least one processor individually or collectively, cause the electronic device to:
identify that the second content that was simultaneously obtained with the first content exists in response to:
identifying that each of the metadata of the first content and the second content includes a first parameter indicating that the first content and the second content are simultaneously obtained based on a shooting input (Leppanen: Par. [0068]: temporal data for first and second content is compared; Par. [0070]-[0071]: “The purpose of the analysis of the temporal data 233 in this example is to determine whether at least a portion of the second video content 236 was captured concurrently with at least a portion of the first video content 136”),
identifying a difference between time sections when each of the first content and the second content indicated by the metadata of the contents was obtained is smaller than a preset difference (Leppanen: Par. [0077]-[0079]: “the processor 112 of the first computing device 100 determines that the location, temporal and orientation data 232, 233, 234 associated with the second video content 236 corresponds with the location, temporal and orientation data 132, 133, 134 associated with the first video content 136. This is because … there is an overlap in the time periods over which the first and second video content 136, 236 were captured”. Note, the overlap in time period corresponds to a smaller difference than an non-overlapped difference), or
identifying that the first content and the second content are simultaneously obtained in response to identifying including of a second parameter indicated by the metadata of the first content and the second content and indicating that the electronic device and one or more external electronic devices, which obtain each of the first content and the second content, are simultaneously obtained when each of the first content and the second content were obtained.
The motivation to combine references is the same as regarding claim 1.
Consider claims 11 and 17, the method is rejected based on the same rationale as the device of claims 1 and 7, respectively.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. US 20220179665 A1 to Rathod discloses methods for editing concurrently captured videos (Par. [0676]) relevant to claim 1.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to STEPHEN R SMITH whose telephone number is (571)270-1318. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9-5.
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STEPHEN R. SMITH
Examiner
Art Unit 2484
/THAI Q TRAN/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2484