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
Election/Restrictions
Applicant’s election of species(i) including claims 1-14 in the reply filed on 06/01/2026 is acknowledged. Because applicant did not distinctly and specifically point out the supposed errors in the restriction requirement, the election has been treated as an election without traverse (MPEP § 818.01(a)).
Claims 15-20 are withdrawn from further consideration pursuant to 37 CFR 1.142(b) as being drawn to a nonelected species, there being no allowable generic or linking claim. Election was made without traverse in the reply filed on 06/01/2026.
Specification
The disclosure is objected to because of the following informalities: The specification states, In paragraph 0062, that “photogrammetry techniques are described in commonly-owned U.S. Pat. No. 10,782,188, the contents of which are incorporated by reference herein”. However, it appears that U.S. Patent. No. 10,782,188 does not describe photogrammetry techniques.
Appropriate correction is required.
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.
Claim(s) 1- 14 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Doring (US 2021/0404792) in view of Xiao (US 2021/0366082) .
As to claim 1, Doring discloses a computer-implemented method for sharpening an image acquired during movement of a three-dimensional (3D) coordinate measurement device (para. 0011), the method comprising:
receiving the image from the 3D coordinate measurement device, wherein the image was acquired while the 3D coordinate measurement device was moving (para. 0011, 0061);
performing, using the sharpened image, a scanning operation (para. 0055, 0059, 0061).
Doring does not disclose sharpening the image to generate a sharpened image based at least in part on at least one of movement information about the movement of the 3D coordinate measurement device or depth information.
Xiao teaches sharpening the image to generate a sharpened image based at least in part on at least one of movement information about the movement of the 3D coordinate measurement device or depth information (para. 0026, 0030, 0036-0037, e.g., “Our super-sampling method may take the color, depth, and motion vectors of multiple low-resolution frames, and produce high-fidelity reconstructions by reducing aliasing and recovering scene details”).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to incorporate Xiao’s teachings into Doring since doing so would merely combine prior art elements according to known methods to yield predictable results, and improve image quality.
As to claim 2, the combination of Doring and Xiao discloses the computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein receiving the image from the 3D coordinate measurement device comprises acquiring, by the 3D coordinate measurement device, the image (Doring, para. 0061).
As to claim 3, the combination of Doring and Xiao discloses the computer-implemented method of claim 2, wherein the image is acquired using a color camera sensor (Doring, para. 0120).
As to claim 4, the combination of Doring and Xiao discloses the computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the movement information comprises rotational velocity of a rotation of the 3D coordinate measurement device about an axis of rotation (Doring, para. 0133).
As to claim 5, the combination of Doring and Xiao discloses the computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the movement information comprises an angle of an orientation of an axis of rotation relative to gravity (Doring, para. 0133).
As to claim 6, the combination of Doring and Xiao discloses thee computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the movement information comprises a distance of an entrance pupil of a color camera sensor of the 3D coordinate measurement device to an axis of rotation (Doring, para. 0111).
As to claim 7, the combination of Doring and Xiao discloses the computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the movement information comprises an angle between an optical axis of a color camera sensor of the 3D coordinate measurement device and an axis of rotation (Doring, para. 0133).
As to claim 8, the combination of Doring and Xiao discloses the computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the depth information is measured based at least in part on a speed of light in air using a time-of-flight method (Doring, para. 0147).
As to claim 9, the combination of Doring and Xiao discloses the computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the depth information is estimated using photogrammetry (Doring, para. 0129).
As to claim 10, the combination of Doring and Xiao discloses the computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the operation is selected from a group consisting of feature detection, tracking, and loop closure (Doring, para. 0059, 0061, 0129, 0130, 0148).
As to claim 11, the combination of Doring and Xiao discloses the computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the moving comprises the 3D coordinate measurement device rotating about an axis of rotation (Doring, para. 0133, 0136).
As to claim 12, the combination of Doring and Xiao discloses the computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the sharpening comprises applying machine learning to the image (Xiao , para. 0049, 0060).
As to claim 13, the combination of Doring and Xiao discloses the computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the sharpening comprises applying deconvolution to the image (Xiao, para. 0042, 0047, 0049, 0060).
As to claim 14, the combination of Doring and Xiao discloses the computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising displaying, on a display, the sharpened image (Doring, para. 00068, 069, 0112, 0151, 0164).
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
BELLIS et al. disclose a multi-dimensional solution directed to employment of a low-resolution motion tracking technique to estimate a homogeneous transformation matrix that is further adapted to accurately characterize movement/motion between successive positions of an object through time.
Mueller et al. disclose apparatus and method for creating 3D imagery of an object using calibration means to transfer data to a reference frame and visibility analysis to determine and resolve occlusion.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to PHUOC TRAN whose telephone number is (571)272-7399. The examiner can normally be reached 9am-5pm.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Vu Le can be reached at 571-272-7332. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/PHUOC TRAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2668
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