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 .
Examiner Notes
Examiner cites particular columns and line numbers in the references as applied to the claims below for the convenience of the applicant. Although the specified citations are representative of the teachings in the art and are applied to the specific limitations within the individual claim, other passages and figures may apply as well. It is respectfully requested that, in preparing responses, the applicant fully consider the references in entirety as potentially teaching all or part of the claimed invention, as well as the context of the passage as taught by the prior art or disclosed by the examiner.
Priority
As required by M.P.E.P. 201.14(c), acknowledgement is made of applicant’s claim for priority based on the application filed on March 30th, 2023 (JP 2023-054468). Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers submitted under 35 U.S.C. 119(a)-(d), which papers have been placed of record in the file.
Information Disclosure Statement
As required by M.P.E.P. 609, the applicant’s submissions of the Information Disclosure Statement dated March 25th, 2024 is acknowledged by the examiner and the cited references have been considered in the examination of the claims now pending.
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 and 3 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Moskovich (US 4,462,664) in view of Fantone et al. (US 4,545,655).
Regarding claim 1, Moskovich teaches an imaging optical system consisting of:
a first lens group having positive power (See, e.g. GPI in Fig. 3b and the abstract which explains it is positive);
a second lens group having negative power (See, e.g., GPII in Fig. 3b and the abstract which explains it is negative); and
a third lens group having positive power (See, e.g., GPIII in Fig. 3b and the abstract which explains it is positive),
the first lens group, the second lens group, and the third lens group being arranged in this order such that the first lens group is located closer to an object than the second lens group or the third lens group is (See, e.g., Fig. 3b),
the second lens group moving along an optical axis of the imaging optical system toward an image plane, while the imaging optical system is focusing to make a transition from an infinity in-focus state toward a close-object in-focus state (See, e.g., the abstract which explains the second group can move to vary the focal length),
the first lens group including a negative lens having a convex surface facing the object (See, e.g., L1 in Fig. 3b), the negative lens being located closest to the object in the first lens group (See, e.g., Fig. 3b),
the second lens group consisting of:
a positive lens Lp having a convex surface facing the object (See, e.g., L4 in Fig. 3b); and
a negative lens Ln (See, e.g., the combination of L5 and L6 in Fig. 3b),
the positive lens Lp and the negative lens Ln being arranged in this order such that the positive lens Lp is located closer to the object than the negative lens Ln is (See, e.g., Fig. 3b),
the third lens group consisting of three or more lenses, the three or more lenses including one or more negative lenses, one of the three or more lenses which is located closest to the object in the third lens group being a positive lens (See, e.g., L7-L12 in Fig. 3b, specifically L12 being negative and L7 being positive and closest to the object).
Moskovich lacks an explicit disclosure wherein the second lens group is located closer to the image plane than an aperture stop is.
However, in an analogous field of endeavor Fantone teaches an aperture stop between a first lens group and a second group (See, e.g., Fig. 3 which shows this).
Accordingly, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art to modify the device of Moskovich to include an aperture stop in the manner taught by Fantone for the purpose of controlling the amount of light that reaches the second and third lens groups and thus the image plane.
Regarding claim 3, Moskovich teaches the device set forth above and further teaches wherein the imaging optical system satisfies the following Inequality (2): nLp > 1.8 (2) where nLp is a refractive index of the positive lens Lp (See, e.g., TABLE VIII which shows L4 to have an index of refraction of 1.847 which meets this limitation).
Claim(s) 10 and 11 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Moskovich (US 4,462,664) in view of Fantone et al. (US 4,545,655) and further in view of Wakui (US 2001/0012450 A1).
Regarding claim 10, Moskovich in view of Fantone teaches a camera system comprising: the imaging optical system of claim 1 (See, e.g., the rejection of claim 1 above).
Moskovich in view of Fantone lacks an explicit disclosure wherein the camera system comprises an interchangeable lens unit; and a camera body including: an image sensor configured to receive an optical image formed by the imaging optical system and transform the optical image into an electrical image signal and a camera mount, the camera body being configured to be connected removably to the interchangeable lens unit via the camera mount, the interchangeable lens unit forming the optical image of the object on the image sensor.
However, in an analogous field of endeavor Wakui teaches the use of an interchangeable lens unit (See, e.g., paragraph [0096] which explains this); and a camera body (See, e.g., Fig. 1) having an image sensor formed by an imaging optical system which transforms the optical image into an electrical image signal (See, e.g., CCD 26 in Fig. 3) and a camera mount, the camera body being configured to be connected removably to the interchangeable lens unit via the camera mount (See, e.g., Fig. 1 and note that the camera mount can be said to be the connection point of the interchangeable lens unit and the camera body), the interchangeable lens unit forming the optical image of the object on the image sensor (Note this is how a camera of this type works in normal operation).
Accordingly, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to modify the device of Moskovich in the combination of Moskovich and Fantone to be housed inside an interchangeable lens unit connected to a camera having an image sensor, as taught by Wakui, for the purpose of having more utility in the device (Note that on its own a lens system is not particularly useful, but implemented into a camera inherently increases the usefulness of the lens system).
Regarding claim 11, Moskovich in view of Fantone teaches an image capture device, the image capture device comprising: the imaging optical system of claim 1 (See, e.g., the rejection of claim 1 above).
Moskovich in view of Fantone lacks an explicit disclosure wherein the image capture device is configured to transform an optical image of the object into an electrical image signal and display and/or store the electrical image signal thus transformed, wherein the optical system of claim 1 is configured to form the optical image of the object; and an image sensor configured to transform the optical image formed by the imaging optical system into the electrical image signal.
However, in an analogous field of endeavor Wakui teaches the use of an image capture device configured to transform an optical image of the object into an electrical image signal and display and/or store the electrical image signal thus transformed (See, e.g., Fig. 3 which shows the various elements such as a lens and memory and image sensor that achieve this, note that this is a very conventional camera design); and an image sensor configured to transform the optical image formed by the imaging optical system into the electrical image signal (See, e.g., CCD 26 in Fig. 3).
Accordingly, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to modify the device of Moskovich in the combination of Moskovich and Fantone to be housed inside a lens barrel connected to a camera having an image sensor, as taught by Wakui, for the purpose of having more utility in the device (Note that on its own a lens system is not particularly useful, but implemented into a camera inherently increases the usefulness of the lens system).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2 and 4-9 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 an examiner’s reasons for indicating allowable subject matter:
Regarding claim 2, the prior art, alone or in combination, fails to teach wherein the imaging optical system satisfies the following Inequality (1): 0.8 < |f3/f2| < 3.0 (1) where f2 is a focal length of the second lens group, and f3 is a focal length of the third lens group.
Regarding claim 4, the prior art, alone or in combination, fails to teach wherein the imaging optical system satisfies the following Inequality (3): 0.15 < |fen/fep| < 1.0 (3) where fen is a focal length of a negative lens belonging to the imaging optical system which is located closer to the image plane than any other one of a plurality of negative lenses included in the imaging optical system is, and fep is a focal length of a positive lens belonging to the imaging optical system which is located closer to the image plane than any other one of a plurality of positive lenses included in the imaging optical system is.
Regarding claim 5, the prior art, alone or in combination, fails to teach wherein a lens belonging to the sub-lens group G1a which is located closest to the image plane in the sub-lens group G1a is a positive lens belonging to the imaging optical system which is located closer to the object than any other one of a plurality of positive lenses included in the imaging optical system is.
Regarding claim 9, the prior art, alone or in combination, fails to teach wherein the imaging optical system satisfies the following Inequality (7): 0.5 < BF/Y < 1.0 (7) where BF is a back focus length of the imaging optical system, and Y is a maximum image height.
Regarding claims 6-8, these claims depend on an allowable base claim and are therefore allowable for at least the reasons stated supra.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Mitchell Oestreich whose telephone number is (571)270-7559. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 7:00-11:00 MT.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Bumsuk Won can be reached at 571-272-2713. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/MITCHELL T OESTREICH/Examiner, Art Unit 2872
/BUMSUK WON/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2872