DETAILED ACTION
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Claims 1-7 are pending.
Claim Objections
Claims 4 and 5 are objected to because of the following informalities:
Claim 4, line 2: “an movement” should be changed to --a movement--.
Claim 5, line 2: “determine” should be replaced with --determines--.
Appropriate correction is required.
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.
Claims 1 and 3-7 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Boukheddimi et al. (“Robot Dance Generation with Music Based Trajectory Optimization”).
Boukheddimi teaches:
Re claim 1. An apparatus control device for controlling an apparatus, the device comprising:
at least one processor (inherently necessary to perform the computations laid out throughout Boukheddimi for real-time trajectory tracking and generation, and for executing the software. See, for example, Sections D, E, and IV on page 3073) configured to
determine a characteristic of a performance sound around the apparatus (pages 3071-3072, section A. Music Analysis, extract beat timings, estimating a global tempo, extract volume and vocal melody.),
determine a situation of the apparatus or a situation around the apparatus (Fig. 3, Robot Joint Limits and Robot Dynamics are input to the Optimal Control block. Page 3071, section B. Optimality in Action, position, velocity, acceleration, and mass-inertia matrix of the robot, gravity force vector, and the initial state, f0. Page 3072, section B. Choreographers, “The added complexity in this method compared to the first method is that joint velocity limits are not considered, requiring an additional step of optimizing the trajectory times to allow feasible transitions on the robot.”, “As one configuration feature
f
d
i
s
t
p
, the distance between the hands is used… A second configuration feature
f
h
e
i
g
h
t
p
is the z coordinate value of the higher end effector”. Page 3073, section D. Optimal Control, “The optimization problem considers as input the robot dynamics defined in (5) along with the state and torque control limits of the robot.”), and
when causing the apparatus to execute a performance coordinated action that is coordinated with the performance sound based on the determined characteristic of the performance sound, reflect the determined situation to the performance coordinated action (Abstract, “a novel formalization of robot dancing as planning and control of optimally timed actions based on beat timings and additional features extracted from the music.” Fig. 3, Robot Joint Limits, Choreography Timing Optimization, and Robot Dynamics are input to the Optimal Control block. Page 3072, section B. Choreographers, “The added complexity in this method compared to the first method is that joint velocity limits are not considered, requiring an additional step of optimizing the trajectory times to allow feasible transitions on the robot.” Page 3073, section B. Method 2: Imitate Choreography (Macarena), “some transitions […] are too fast for the robot to perform within the ideal duration […]. These particularly long motions in the middle of the dance are compensated for by the choreography timing optimization, such that transitions in the temporal vicinity of these motions are sped up.”).
Re claim 3. Wherein the at least one processor changes at least a timing of the performance coordinated action in accordance with the determined situation (Page 3072, section B. Choreographers, “The added complexity in this method compared to the first method is that joint velocity limits are not considered, requiring an additional step of optimizing the trajectory times to allow feasible transitions on the robot.” Page 3073, section B. Method 2: Imitate Choreography (Macarena), “some transitions […] are too fast for the robot to perform within the ideal duration […]. These particularly long motions in the middle of the dance are compensated for by the choreography timing optimization, such that transitions in the temporal vicinity of these motions are sped up.”).
Re claim 4. Wherein the at least one processor changes at least one of an movement amount and a speed of the performance coordinated action in accordance with the determined situations (Page 3072, section B. Choreographers, “The added complexity in this method compared to the first method is that joint velocity limits are not considered, requiring an additional step of optimizing the trajectory times to allow feasible transitions on the robot.” Page 3073, section B. Method 2: Imitate Choreography (Macarena), “some transitions […] are too fast for the robot to perform within the ideal duration […]. These particularly long motions in the middle of the dance are compensated for by the choreography timing optimization, such that transitions in the temporal vicinity of these motions are sped up.”).
Re claim 5. Wherein the at least one processor determine a tempo of the performance sound as the characteristic of the performance sound (page 3071, section A. Music Analysis, “estimating a global tempo of the music”).
Re claim 6. An apparatus control method for controlling an apparatus, the method comprising:
determining a characteristic of a performance sound around the apparatus (pages 3071-3072, section A. Music Analysis, extract beat timings, estimating a global tempo, extract volume and vocal melody.);
determining a situation of the apparatus or a situation around the apparatus (Fig. 3, Robot Joint Limits and Robot Dynamics are input to the Optimal Control block. Page 3071, section B. Optimality in Action, position, velocity, acceleration, and mass-inertia matrix of the robot, gravity force vector, and the initial state, f0. Page 3072, section B. Choreographers, “The added complexity in this method compared to the first method is that joint velocity limits are not considered, requiring an additional step of optimizing the trajectory times to allow feasible transitions on the robot.”, “As one configuration feature
f
d
i
s
t
p
, the distance between the hands is used… A second configuration feature
f
h
e
i
g
h
t
p
is the z coordinate value of the higher end effector”. Page 3073, section D. Optimal Control, “The optimization problem considers as input the robot dynamics defined in (5) along with the state and torque control limits of the robot.”); and
when causing the apparatus to execute a performance coordinated action that is coordinated with the performance sound based on the determined characteristic of the performance sound, reflecting the determined situation to the performance coordinated action (Abstract, “a novel formalization of robot dancing as planning and control of optimally timed actions based on beat timings and additional features extracted from the music.” Fig. 3, Robot Joint Limits, Choreography Timing Optimization, and Robot Dynamics are input to the Optimal Control block. Page 3072, section B. Choreographers, “The added complexity in this method compared to the first method is that joint velocity limits are not considered, requiring an additional step of optimizing the trajectory times to allow feasible transitions on the robot.” Page 3073, section B. Method 2: Imitate Choreography (Macarena), “some transitions […] are too fast for the robot to perform within the ideal duration […]. These particularly long motions in the middle of the dance are compensated for by the choreography timing optimization, such that transitions in the temporal vicinity of these motions are sped up.”).
Re claim 7. A non-transitory recording medium storing a program (page 3073, section IV. Experimental Results, software tools), the program causing a computer to execute processing comprising:
determining a characteristic of a performance sound around the apparatus (pages 3071-3072, section A. Music Analysis, extract beat timings, estimating a global tempo, extract volume and vocal melody.);
determining a situation of the apparatus or a situation around the apparatus (Fig. 3, Robot Joint Limits and Robot Dynamics are input to the Optimal Control block. Page 3071, section B. Optimality in Action, position, velocity, acceleration, and mass-inertia matrix of the robot, gravity force vector, and the initial state, f0. Page 3072, section B. Choreographers, “The added complexity in this method compared to the first method is that joint velocity limits are not considered, requiring an additional step of optimizing the trajectory times to allow feasible transitions on the robot.”, “As one configuration feature
f
d
i
s
t
p
, the distance between the hands is used… A second configuration feature
f
h
e
i
g
h
t
p
is the z coordinate value of the higher end effector”. Page 3073, section D. Optimal Control, “The optimization problem considers as input the robot dynamics defined in (5) along with the state and torque control limits of the robot.”); and
when causing the apparatus to execute a performance coordinated action that is coordinated with the performance sound based on the determined characteristic of the performance sound, reflecting the determined situation to the performance coordinated action (Abstract, “a novel formalization of robot dancing as planning and control of optimally timed actions based on beat timings and additional features extracted from the music.” Fig. 3, Robot Joint Limits, Choreography Timing Optimization, and Robot Dynamics are input to the Optimal Control block. Page 3072, section B. Choreographers, “The added complexity in this method compared to the first method is that joint velocity limits are not considered, requiring an additional step of optimizing the trajectory times to allow feasible transitions on the robot.” Page 3073, section B. Method 2: Imitate Choreography (Macarena), “some transitions […] are too fast for the robot to perform within the ideal duration […]. These particularly long motions in the middle of the dance are compensated for by the choreography timing optimization, such that transitions in the temporal vicinity of these motions are sped up.”).
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 2 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Boukheddimi et al. (“Robot Dance Generation with Music Based Trajectory Optimization”) as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Hayashi et al. (US Publication No. 2019/0389058).
The teachings of Boukheddimi have been discussed above. Boukheddimi fails to specifically teach: (re claim 2) wherein the at least one processor determines, as the situation, at least any one of a pseudo-emotion, a pseudo-personality, a battery remaining level, an attitude, and a place, of the apparatus, a current time, and a situation of another same type of apparatus that is located nearby.
Hayashi teaches, at paragraph [0213], selecting a type of dancing based on an emotion parameter of the robot. This allows for a performance effect in which the actions of the robot differ in accordance with the psychological state of the robot at the time, and thus the robot can convey its psychological state though dance.
In view of Hayashi’s teachings, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to include, with the apparatus as taught by Boukheddimi, (re claim 2) wherein the at least one processor determines, as the situation, at least any one of a pseudo-emotion, a pseudo-personality, a battery remaining level, an attitude, and a place, of the apparatus, a current time, and a situation of another same type of apparatus that is located nearby, with a reasonable expectation of success, since Hayashi teaches selecting a type of dancing based on an emotion parameter of the robot. This allows for a performance effect in which the actions of the robot differ in accordance with the psychological state of the robot at the time, and thus the robot can convey its psychological state though dance.
Conclusion
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/SPENCER D PATTON/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3656