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 .
Election/Restrictions
Applicant’s election without traverse of Species II in the reply filed on June 17, 2026, is acknowledged.
Claims 1 – 24 are currently pending.
Claims 6 – 7 and 12 – 12 are withdrawn.
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
Specification
The title of the invention is not descriptive. A new title is required that is clearly indicative of the invention to which the claims are directed.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 1 – 5, 8 – 11 and 22 – 24 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Claim 1, 23, and 24 recites the limitation "the number of areas" in lines 6-7. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 1, 23 and 24 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being incomplete for omitting essential elements and/or steps, such omission amounting to a gap between the elements and/or steps. See MPEP § 2172.01. The omitted elements and/or steps are:
The “imaging region” needs to be divided into “a plurality of areas”, and “defocus amounts” of the plurality of areas are to be obtained, and “reliabilities” of the defocus amounts are obtained and determined to be “low”, and the number of low regions are counted.
Where and what is the “imaging region”? Is this related to an image sensor or a display?
How is “the number of the areas” determined? Is there a counter?
How are the defocus amounts obtained? Calculated or predetermined?
How is reliability determined? How does it relate to the defocus amount?
What is low?
Claims 2 – 5, 8 – 11 and 22 rejected as being dependent on claim 1.
Claim 5 and 11 includes the limitation “the nearest value of the plurality of defocus amounts”. What is meant by nearest value? Nearest to what?
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 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.
(a)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claim(s) 1, 4, 5, 8 – 9, and 22 – 24 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Fukuda (US 2014/0320711).
Regarding claim 1, Fukuda discloses, in at least figures 1 and 7, a focus control device that determines a defocus amount for driving a focus lens, the focus control device comprising: a processor (121); and a memory (121), wherein the processor is configured to: obtain, in a state where a plurality of areas are set in an imaging region (¶54: S101), the number of the areas of which reliabilities of defocus amounts obtained from the plurality of areas are low (¶59-64: S202-207); and determine the defocus amount for driving the focus lens based on an index related to a plurality of the defocus amounts in a case where the number is equal to or larger than a first threshold value (¶67-70: S301-304; defocus amount related to a plurality of defocus amounts assuming the number of low areas is greater any value).
Regarding claim 4, Fukuda discloses the limitations of claim 1. Fukuda also teaches wherein the processor is configured to determine the defocus amount for driving the focus lens based on a distance to a subject corresponding to the defocus amount in a case where the number is smaller than the first threshold value (¶49).
Regarding claim 5, Fukuda discloses the limitations of claim 1. Fukuda also teaches wherein the processor is configured to determine a nearest value of the plurality of defocus amounts as the defocus amount for driving the focus lens in a case where the number is smaller than the first threshold value (¶49).
Regarding claim 8, Fukuda discloses the limitations of claim 1. Fukuda also teaches wherein the reliability is related to saturations of a plurality of pixels included in the area, and the processor is configured to determine the reliability based on the saturations (¶60).
Regarding claim 9, Fukuda discloses the limitations of claim 1. Fukuda also teaches wherein the processor is configured to: divide each of the plurality of areas into a plurality of blocks (¶54), and determine whether or not each of the blocks is a saturated block based on a content rate of the saturated pixels in each of the blocks; and determine that the reliability is low in a case where the number of the saturated blocks is equal to or larger than a second threshold value (¶60).
Regarding claim 22, Fukuda discloses the limitations of claim 1. Fukuda also teaches an imaging element (¶26: 107).
Claim 23 and 24 rejected as applied to claim 1 above. The method steps as claimed would have been implied by the apparatus of Fukuda.
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.
Claim(s) 2 – 3, 10, 11 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Fukuda in view of Wakui (US 2020/0404186).
Regarding claim 2, Fukuda discloses the limitations of claim 1. Fukuda fails to explicitly disclose wherein the index is an index based on a frequency of the plurality of defocus amounts.
In a similar field of endeavor, Wakui teaches a defocusing device that determines a statistical value, such as the median value, of the defocus amounts of the plurality of marker images discriminated by the discriminator 32 for one captured image G0 as the defocus amount of the captured image G0 (fig. 8; ¶75). In light of the teaching of Wakui, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the invention, to use Wakui’s teaching in Fukuda’s system because an artisan of ordinarily skill would recognize that this would result in accurately discriminated defocus amounts
Regarding claim 3, Fukuda discloses the limitations of claim 1. Fukuda fails to explicitly disclose wherein the index is an index based on a median value of the plurality of defocus amounts.
In a similar field of endeavor, Wakui teaches a defocusing device that determines a statistical value, such as the median value, of the defocus amounts of the plurality of marker images discriminated by the discriminator 32 for one captured image G0 as the defocus amount of the captured image G0 (fig. 8; ¶75). In light of the teaching of Wakui, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the invention, to use Wakui’s teaching in Fukuda’s system because an artisan of ordinarily skill would recognize that this would result in accurately discriminated defocus amounts
Regarding claim 10, Fukuda discloses the limitations of claim 9. Fukuda also teaches wherein the processor is configured to: determine the area in which the number of the saturated blocks is equal to or larger than the second threshold value, as a first area (¶60). Fukuda fails to explicitly disclose set a median value of defocus amounts corresponding to the plurality of blocks included in the first area, as a defocus amount of the first area.
In a similar field of endeavor, Wakui teaches a defocusing device that determines a statistical value, such as the median value, of the defocus amounts of the plurality of marker images discriminated by the discriminator 32 for one captured image G0 as the defocus amount of the captured image G0 (fig. 8; ¶75). In light of the teaching of Wakui, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the invention, to use Wakui’s teaching in Fukuda’s system because an artisan of ordinarily skill would recognize that this would result in accurately discriminated defocus amounts
Regarding claim 11, Fukuda in view of Wakui discloses the limitations of claim 10. Fukuda also teaches wherein the processor is configured to: determine the area in which the number of the saturated blocks is smaller than the second threshold value, as a second area; and set a nearest value of defocus amounts corresponding to the plurality of blocks included in the second area, as a defocus amount of the second area (¶60).
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Contact
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ANTOINETTE SPINKS whose telephone number is (571)270-3749. The examiner can normally be reached M-Th 7am - 5pm EST.
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/ANTOINETTE T SPINKS/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2639
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