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 .
Status of Claims
The amendment filed on 4/20/2026 has been entered. In the amendment, Applicant amended claims 22-27, 34-37, 39 and 41. Currently claims 22-41 are pending.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claim 22-25, 31, 33-37 and 41 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Fersch et al. (US 2016/0300577).
Regarding claim 22, Fersch teaches an apparatus (Fig. 3: system 300 for rendering audio content; Fig. 4: example computer system 400; [0066]; [0069]; Examiner’s Note: a general purpose computer, a special purpose computer or a programmable data processing apparatus as exemplary apparatus) comprising:
at least one processor (Fig. 4: CPU 401; [0069]); and
at least one memory storing instructions (Fig. 4: ROM 402, RAM 403; [0068]) storing instructions ([0063]; [0069]) that, when executed with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus at least to:
obtain media content ([0019]: “audio content as input”), wherein the media content comprises at least one audio content;
obtain content information (Fig. 1, step S101 and Fig. 2, steps S201 and S205:, content information is interpreted as information including “a priority level for an audio object in the audio content”, i.e., preset “priority metadata or priority information”, and quantity of audio objects in the audio content) configured to control rending (Figs. 1-2: controlling selection of a rending mode is a form of controlling rending), the content information comprising an identification of the at least one audio content ([0022]-[0024]; [0040]; Examiner’s Note: as some examples disclosed in [0022]-[0025], “an identification” is interpreted as a preset priority level of an audio object of media content, which is optionally included in priority metadata);
control rendering of the at least one audio content based, at least partially, on the identification of the at least one audio content, comprising causing the apparatus to at least one of:
reduce audible focus on the at least one audio content during rendering ([0028]: “As for the rendering mode B, it may render the audio object to its correct and accurate position, but ignore the processing of other parameters, such as size, divergence”);
move an audible location of the at least one audio content during rendering ([0029]: “The rendering mode C pans the audio object through a given array of output channels over time. This means that the audio object will be placed correctly along one axis, e.g., along the horizontal axis, while the positioning along other axes may be ignored); and
provide the rendering of the at least one audio content based on the controlled rendering (Fig. 1: steps S102-S103; Fig. 2: steps S209-S210])
Regarding claim 23, Fersch further teaches the apparatus of claim 22, wherein controlling the rendering of the at least one audio content comprises the at least one memory stores instructions that, when executed with the at least one processor, further cause the apparatus to:
dampen rendering of the at least one audio content ([0024]: “the object's gain may also be useful when determining how important the object is”; [0030]: “For the rendering mode E, the audio object will only be mixed into one output channel, which is the worst performed situation, but the audio object is still audible. Finally for the rendering mode F, the audio object may not be rendered, meaning that the audio object is discarded or muted”).
Regarding claim 24, Fersch further teaches the apparatus of claim 22, wherein the rendering of the at least one audio content is further based on a quota associated with the identification (Fig. 2: step S208, “a computing level” read on a quota; [0043]-[0053]), wherein the quota is configured to define an amount of audio content ([0019]: “The audio objects will be rendered in different rendering modes according to their priority level, so that less important objects may be rendered in a less complex way to save computational resources, while important objects may be rendered without compromise by allocating more computational resources”; [0024]).
Regarding claim 25, Fersch further teaches the apparatus of claim 24, wherein controlling the rendering of the at least one audio content comprises the at least one memory stores instructions that, when executed with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus to:
determine that the quota associated with the priority identification of the at least one audio content is full (Fig. 2: step S206-S207; [0042]); and
modify the priority identification of the at least one audio content to be a lower priority classification (Fig. 2: steps S206, S208; [0043]-[0053]).
Regarding claim 31, Fersch further teaches the apparatus of claim 22, wherein content information comprises at least one of:
an identifier parameter ([0023]: a number from 1 to N associated with the priority level of an audio object reads on an identifier parameter) for identifying which of the at least one audio content the content information is for;
a priority class parameter ([0024]: a spectral parameter, which is necessarily used for spectral analysis to determining a human voice, reads on a priority class parameter) for classifying the at least one audio content with respect to identifying a rendering effect to be applied to the at least one audio content;
a priority effect parameter ([0024]: “Other metadata of the audio object such as the object's gain may also be useful when determining how important the object is”) defining the rendering effect to be applied to the at least one audio content; or
Regarding claim 33, Fersch further teaches the apparatus of claim 22, wherein the at least one audio content comprises at least one object (Fig. 1: step S101, Fig. 2: steps 201, 205; [0009]-[0010]: “an audio object in the audio content”), wherein the content information comprises priority content information (Fig. 1: step S101; Fig. 2: steps S201-S203), wherein the identification comprises an identification for determining and classifying the at least one audio content ([0022]-[0024]; [0040]; Examiner’s Note: as some examples disclosed in [0024], “an identification identifying and classifying the at least one audio content” is necessarily implemented in order for determining a particular audio object to be human voice, or a particular audio object to have its position far from the center of the entire sound field, and for assignment of an audio object’s gain).
Claim 34 is rejected for substantially the same rationale as applied to claim 22.
Claim 35 is rejected for substantially the same rationale as applied to claim 23.
Claim 36 is rejected for substantially the same rationale as applied to claim 24.
Claim 37 is rejected for substantially the same rationale as applied to claim 25.
Claim 41 is rejected for rejected for substantially the same rationale applied to claims 22 and 34.
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 29-30 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Fersch et al. (US 2016/0300577) in view of Leppanen et al. (EP 3174005).
Regarding claim 29, Fersch does not further teach the apparatus of claim 22, wherein the media content further comprises at least one of:
video content; or
image content.
However, it is not new in the related art that media content includes video content or image content , in addition to audio content.
Leppanen, for instance, teaches in [0001] media content includes video content or image content ([0001]: “The present disclosure relates to the field of control of audio mixing of groups of distinct audio sources in a virtual or augmented reality view”).
Before the effective filing date of the invention, it would have been obvious for one ordinary skill in the art to apply Fersch’s audio rendering technique with Leppanen’s technique to expand a market share of Fersch’s audio rendering technique to the application field of augmented reality.
Regarding claim 30, Leppanen further teaches the apparatus of claim 22, wherein the media content comprises at least one spatial audio signal which defines an audio scene (Figs. 3-9: audio scene is part of virtual scene with singers and presenter), wherein the at least one audio signal object is located in the audio scene ([0031]; Figs. 3-9: audio signal object corresponding to singers and presenter is located in virtual scene), and wherein the at least one spatial audio signal is configured to be rendered according to a content consumer movement ([0034]: last sentence; [0040]).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 26-28, 32 and 38-40 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.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed on 4/20/2026 with regard to claims 22, 34 and 41 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
Applicants asserts that Fersch does not teach the independent claims 22, 34 and 41 with regard to feature that the content information configured to control rendering. Examiner must respectfully disagree.
The current claim language merely indicates that the action to “control rendering” of at least one audio content by the obtained content information is partially based on the identification of the at least one audio content and omits other parameter(s)/data in the content information being employed to control rendering. For the current claim language, as detailed in the prior art rejection in this examination, Fersch teaches controlling a selection of rendering mode based on “an identification” that is interpreted, under the Broadest Reasonable Interpretation (BRI), as a preset priority level of an audio object in media content information that is optionally included in priority metadata. As a matter of facts, Applicant acknowledges in the Arguments that Fersch teaches of a control of selecting one rendering mode among a plurality of rendering modes. Controlling a selection of rendering mode is reasonably an approach of controlling rendering, unless Applicant would provide additional differentiating limitations on how to control rendering based on parameter(s)/data in the content information.
Applicant does not provide other arguments. Therefore, rejections to claims 22, 34 and 41 are maintained.
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 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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/XUEMEI ZHENG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2629
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