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 .
Applicant(s) Response to Official Action
The response filed on January 8, 2026 has been entered and made of record. Claims 1, 6, 11 and 12 have been amended. Claims 1 – 12 are currently pending in the application.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments see pages 6 – 8 with respect to the rejection of Claims 1 - 12 under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Park et al., (US 2004/0150639 A1) have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new ground of rejection is made in view of the newly discovered reference to position bits indicating a position of a child node, in the second node, including a three-dimensional point, as claimed in the amended Claims 1, 6, 11 and 12. Examiner’s response to the presented arguments follows below:
Applicant argues on page that “Applicant respectfully submits that Park fails to describe, or even suggest, any content corresponding to the location encoding, namely direct encoding: the second mode”. Examiner respectfully disagrees. In response to applicant's argument that the references fail to show certain features of the invention, it is noted that the features upon which applicant relies (i.e., location encoding) are not recited in the rejected claim(s). Although the claims are interpreted in light of the specification, limitations from the specification are not read into the claims. See In re Van Geuns, 988 F.2d 1181, 26 USPQ2d 1057 (Fed. Cir. 1993). Furthermore, dependent claims 2 and 7, merely recite direct encoding. The claims do not further describe or define direct encoding. Given the broadest reasonable interpretation in light of the supporting disclosure, Park discloses in Par. [0087] If the SOP data indicates that the predetermined node is a `P` node, depth information of `B` voxels in the predetermined node is PPM-encoded (i.e. prediction-by-partial-matching algorithm interpreted as direct encoding).
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 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.
Claims 1 - 12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Park et al., (US 2004/0150639 A1) referred to as Park hereinafter, and in view of Samet et al. "Octree approximation and compression methods", 3D Data Processing Visualization and Transmission, IEEE 2002, pp. 460-469 referred to as Samet hereinafter.
Regarding Claim 1, Park teaches a method for encoding three-dimensional data (Abstract, methods and apparatuses for encoding and decoding three-dimensional object data), comprising:
generating an N-ary tree representing a plurality of three-dimensional points (Fig. 3A-3D, Par. [0065], The tree structure generator 1100 receives point texture data, voxel data, or tree-structured data, which represents three-dimensional object data, and generates three-dimensional object data having a tree structure (i.e. N-ary tree) in which each node is labeled to be differentiated from others), where N is an integer of 2 or higher (Par. [0069], FIG. 3(b) illustrates a quadtree corresponding to a binary image, in which depth information of the binary image is set to 2 (i.e. N = 2));
encoding (Par. [0081] FIG. 16 is a flowchart illustrating the operation of the node encoder 1120), using a first mode (Fig. 16, Step 1640 encode ‘S’ node, Par. [0024], encoding the DIB data of the `S` node involves encoding an average of color information (i.e. first mode); and encoding labels of eight sub-nodes of the current node), a first node of nodes each of which is an element of the N-ary tree (Fig. B-3D, Par. [0016] in the tree structure representing the three-dimensional object data, a node (i.e. first node) having sub-nodes is labeled `S`), wherein N bit information each indicating an existence of a child node at a particular position in the first node is encoded (Par. [0069], FIG. 3(a) illustrates a parent-children relationship in a quadtree structure Par. [0017], encoding detailed information bit (DIB) data (i.e. N bit information) of an `S` node if the node information indicates that the current node is an `S` node. Figs. 3B-3D); and
encoding (Par. [0081] FIG. 16 is a flowchart illustrating the operation of the node encoder 1120), using a second mode (Par. [0026], in encoding the depth information, all nodes below a predetermined node in the tree structure representing the three-dimensional object data are PPM-encoded (i.e. second mode) according to a raster scanning order), a second node (Par. [0016], a node (i.e. second node) whose voxels are encoded using a prediction-by-partial-matching (PPM) algorithm is labeled `P`) of which a depth in the N-ary tree is lower than a depth of the first node (As illustrated in Fig. 3C -3D, ‘P’ nodes are depth 2 (i.e. lower depth) while ‘S’ nodes are depth 1), wherein remaining position bits included in the second node are encoded (Par. [0081], carried out until all nodes are encoded (in step 1650)).
While Park teaches in Par. [0080] that “encodes node position information which indicates the position of each of the candidate nodes in the candidate node queue”, Park does not explicitly teach position bits indicating a position of a child node, in the second node, including a three-dimensional point.
However, Samat teaches position bits indicating a position of a child node, in the second node, (Section 2 Octree representation, Fig. 2, page 3, For example, < 3, 3, 2 > is the sequence of directional codes corresponding to node 35 in Figure 2. CODE(35) = 3 •90+ 3 • 91 + 2 • 92 = 192 is its locational code) including a three-dimensional point (Section 5, Concluding remarks, page 9, compression of sets of three-dimensional binary objects represented by a pointerless region octree).
References Park and Samat are considered to be analogous art because they relate to three-dimensional coding using octree representations. Therefore, it would have been obvious that one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, would recognize the advantage of further specifying position bits indication a position of a child node as suggested by Samat in the invention of Park in order to represent objects in a octree region and uniquely identify each left node by the path leading from the root of the octree (See Samat, Abstract, Section 2, page 2, Col. 2 second paragraph).
Regarding Claim 2, Park in view of Samat teaches claim 1. Park further teaches wherein the first mode corresponds to an occupancy encoding (Fig. 6, Par. [0086], If the SOP data indicates that the predetermined node is an `S` node, the DIB data is comprised of eight flags indicating what an average color of the predetermined node is and whether or not the predetermined node's children nodes are `W` nodes (i.e. occupancy encoding). Non-`W` nodes are temporarily considered as B nodes and thus are stored in a queue in which `B` candidate nodes for a next bitstream are recorded. FIG. 6 illustrates the structure of an `S` node), and the second mode corresponds to a direct encoding (Par. [0087] If the SOP data indicates that the predetermined node is a `P` node, depth information of `B` voxels in the predetermined node is PPM-encoded (i.e. direct encoding), and color information of the `B` voxels is DPCM-encoded. FIG. 7 illustrates the structure of a bitstream of a `P` node).
Regarding Claim 3, Park in view of Samat teaches claim 1. Park further teaches wherein the second node (Par. [0016], a node (i.e. second node) whose voxels are encoded using a prediction-by-partial-matching (PPM) algorithm is labeled `P`) is not a root node of the N-ary tree (Par. [0068], a root node is labeled `S`).
Regarding Claim 4, Park in view of Samat teaches claim 1. Park further teaches wherein the N-ary tree is an octree (Par. [0065], the tree structure is an octree structure).
Regarding Claim 5, Park in view of Samat teaches claim 1. Park further teaches wherein a value corresponding to the depth of the first node is lower than a value corresponding to the depth of the second node (As illustrated in Fig. 3C -3D, ‘S’ nodes are level 1 (i.e. lower value) while ‘P’ nodes are level 2).
Regarding Claims 6 - 10, the limitations are similar to those treated in the above rejection(s) of Claim 1 - 5, and are met by the reference as discussed above. Claims 6 - 10 however recite a decoding method, rather than an encoding method, which is similar in structure expect in reverse operation. Therefore, claims 6 - 10 are rejected for the same reasons of obviousness as used above.
Apparatus Claim 11 is drawn to the apparatus corresponding to the method of using same as claimed in claim 1. Therefore apparatus claim 11 corresponds to method claim 1, and is rejected for the same reasons of obviousness as used above.
Regarding Claim 12, the limitations are similar to those treated in the above rejection(s) of Claim 11, and are met by the reference as discussed above. Claim 12 however recites a decoding apparatus, rather than an encoding apparatus, which is similar in structure expect in reverse operation. Therefore, claim 12 is rejected for the same reasons of obviousness as used above.
Conclusion
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 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 date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the Examiner should be directed to SUSAN E HODGES whose telephone number is (571)270-0498. The Examiner can normally be reached on M-F 8:00 am - 4:00 pm.
If attempts to reach the Examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the Examiner’s supervisor, Brian T. Pendleton, can be reached on (571) . The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/Susan E. Hodges/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2425