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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 01/07/2026 is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Response to Amendment
In the response filed 01/22/2026, applicant amended claims 1, 6-7, 12, 17-18, 20 and 21. Therefore, claims 1-21 are currently pending.
Response to Arguments
Claims Rejections under 35 U.S.C. §112(b)
The examiner thanks the applicant for their attention to this matter and due to amendment, the claims rejections under 35 U.S.C. §112(b) are hereby withdrawn.
Claims Rejections under 35 U.S.C. §102 and §103
Applicant's arguments filed 01/22/2026 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive. After providing an overview of the functionality of Shankar, applicant alleges it, “does not teach or suggest any operation that corresponds to the first randomized dithering operation that is applied to the first filtered sample from the deblocking filter. In particular, Shankar does not teach or suggest any type of dithering operation that is applied to the output (first filtered sample) of the deblocking filter. Shankar is silent in this regard.” For purposes of simplification, the examiner believes the cited portions speak for themselves and the most relevant portions have been emphasized below:
[0046] For the compression standards (e.g., H.264), however, an in-loop deblocking is introduced. The "in-loop" deblocker is actually used as part of the decoding process, and in the decoding `loop`. After each frame is decoded, the uncompressed data is passed through the in-loop deblocking process in an attempt to eliminate the artificial edges on block boundaries.
[0047] Each compression standard, or decoder may specify its own deblocking algorithm. However, these deblocking algorithms often suffer from the same LSB problem that was discussed above. The deblocking algorithms always round up or down deterministically due to limitations in precision, leading to poor deblocking. According to one embodiment, the randomization in the deblocking process as described above is used to achieve dithered edges via the in-loop deblocker. For example, instead of requiring that all values between 100 and 100.5 will always be rounded down to 100, and all values between 100.5 and 101 will always be rounded up to 101, the deblocking process is configured to require that a value 100.x be randomly rounded up to 101 or down to 100 with probabilities that depend on the exact value of x.
[0048] According to another embodiment, an encoder is modified to ensure that the encoded video does not contain blocks in smooth areas in such a way that does not require the use of too many additional bits for encoding. It is understood that source data is naturally "noisy" or "dithered" in areas with smooth gradients due to the nature of the acquisition process. For example, a digital camera that is focused on a smooth gradient of color acquires a dithered image which appears smooth to the naked eye. Each successive frame of the source material has a different noise pattern due to the randomized nature of the content acquisition. This means that, to accurately compress the noise, a separate noise pattern has to be encoded for each frame. In general, noise does not compress well because of its naturally high entropy. Thus, representing noise accurately requires a lot of bits, if they are subsequently recovered with some fidelity.
The examiner believes this satisfies the matter and no other outstanding issues need to be addressed that aren’t in the rejections below, merely updated to reflect the change in claim language.
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(s) 1-3, 12-14 and 21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Shankar et al., (US 2009/0022418 A1) referred to as SHANKAR hereinafter.
Regarding claim 1, SHANKAR shows a computer-implemented method for reducing banding artifacts in decoded video data (Abstract; Paragraph [0005], i.e., blocking), the method comprising:
receiving a first block of reconstructed samples associated with a frame of encoded video data (Paragraph [0029]-[0030] wherein samples are inherently a part of received frames being decoded in the standards being referenced.);
applying a first filter to a first reconstructed sample included in the first block of reconstructed samples to generate a first filtered sample (Paragraph [0005]);
applying a first randomized dithering operation to the first filtered sample to generate a first dithered sample (Paragraphs [0046]-[0047] discloses wherein an anti-blocking action is taken that involves random dithering.); and
generating a first portion of decoded video data based on the first dithered sample (Paragraphs [0046]-[0048] wherein as the samples are already reconstructed and dithered, if necessary, the stated standards dictate that decoded video is generated for display.).
Regarding claim 2, SHANKAR shows the limitations of claim 1 as applied above, and further shows generating the first block of reconstructed samples by:
performing at least one prediction operation on a block of reference samples to generate a block of predicted samples (Paragraph [0026]);
performing at least one inverse transform operation on (Paragraph [0005], as this is a standard part of the currently held decoding practice.) a block of coefficients to generate a block of residual samples (Paragraph [0027] discloses wherein DCT is used to generate the difference values, i.e., residuals.); and
combining the block of predicted samples with the block of residual samples to generate the first block of reconstructed samples (Paragraph [0027], group of pictures).
Regarding claim 3, SHANKAR shows the limitations of claim 1 as applied above, and further shows wherein applying the first filter comprises performing at least one deblocking operation on one or more reconstructed samples included in the first block of reconstructed samples (Paragraphs [0046]-[0047], Paragraph [0005] also generally discusses in loop filtering being the place where smoothing operations take place.).
Regarding claim 12, SHANKAR shows one or more non-transitory computer-readable media including instructions (Paragraph [0012]) that, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to reduce banding artifacts in decoded video data by performing the steps of:
receiving a first block of reconstructed samples associated with a frame of encoded video data (Paragraph [0029]-[0030] wherein samples are inherently a part of received frames being decoded in the standards being referenced.);
applying a first filter to a first reconstructed sample included in the first block of reconstructed samples to generate a first filtered sample (Paragraph [0005]);
applying a first randomized dithering operation to the first filtered sample to generate a first dithered sample (Paragraphs [0046]-[0047] discloses wherein an anti-blocking action is taken that involves random dithering.); and
generating a first portion of decoded video data based on the first dithered sample (Paragraphs [0046]-[0048] wherein as the samples are already reconstructed and dithered, if necessary, the stated standards dictate that decoded video is generated for display.).
Regarding claim 13, SHANKAR shows the limitations of claim 12 as applied above, and further shows the step of generating the first block of reconstructed samples by:
performing at least one prediction operation on a block of reference samples to generate a block of predicted samples (Paragraph [0026]);
performing at least one inverse transform operation on (Paragraph [0005], as this is a standard part of the currently held decoding practice.) a block of coefficients to generate a block of residual samples (Paragraph [0027] discloses wherein DCT is used to generate the difference values, i.e., residuals.); and
combining the block of predicted samples with the block of residual samples to generate the first block of reconstructed samples (Paragraph [0027], group of pictures).
Regarding claim 14, SHANKAR shows the limitations of claim 12 as applied above, and further shows wherein the step of applying the first filter comprises performing at least one deblocking operation on one or more reconstructed samples included in the first block of reconstructed samples (Paragraphs [0046]-[0047], Paragraph [0005] also generally discusses in loop filtering being the place where smoothing operations take place.).
Regarding claim 21, SHANKAR shows a system comprising:
one or more memories storing instructions (Paragraph [0012]); and
one or more processors (Paragraph [0012]) coupled to the one or more memories that, when executing the instructions, perform the steps of:
receiving a first block of reconstructed samples associated with a frame of encoded video data (Paragraph [0029]-[0030] wherein samples are inherently a part of received frames being decoded in the standards being referenced.);
applying a first filter to a first reconstructed sample included in the first block of reconstructed samples to generate a first filtered sample (Paragraph [0005]);
applying a first randomized dithering operation to the first filtered sample to generate a first dithered sample (Paragraphs [0046]-[0047] discloses wherein an anti-blocking action is taken that involves random dithering.); and
generating a first portion of decoded video data based on the first dithered sample (Paragraphs [0046]-[0048] wherein as the samples are already reconstructed and dithered, if necessary, the stated standards dictate that decoded video is generated for display.).
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.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
Claim(s) 4 and 15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over SHANKAR in view of Sole et al., (A Debanding Filter for AVM) *Full citation in IDS filed 12/09/2024 referred to as SOLE hereinafter.
Regarding claim 4, SHANKAR shows the limitations of claim 1 as applied above, however failing to but SOLE does further show wherein applying the first filter comprises performing at least one constrained directional enhancement operation on one or more reconstructed samples included in the first block of reconstructed samples (Figure 1).
Both SHANKAR and SOLE are analogous to the claimed invention in that they lie in the same field of endeavor and share a solution to blocking or banding in video compression techniques.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one possessing ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify SHANKAR in the spirit of SOLE because it is well-known in the art that CDEF maximizes vectorization efficiency by taking into account the direction of edges and patterns being filtered.
Regarding claim 15, SHANKAR shows the limitations of claim 12 as applied above, however failing to but SOLE does further show wherein applying the first filter comprises performing at least one constrained directional enhancement operation on one or more reconstructed samples included in the first block of reconstructed samples (Figure 1).
Both SHANKAR and SOLE are analogous to the claimed invention in that they lie in the same field of endeavor and share a solution to blocking or banding in video compression techniques.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one possessing ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify SHANKAR in the spirit of SOLE because it is well-known in the art that CDEF maximizes vectorization efficiency by taking into account the direction of edges and patterns being filtered.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 5-11 and 16-20 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.
Conclusion
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. 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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JUSTIN W. RIDER whose telephone number is (571)270-1068. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday, 7.00 am - 4.30 pm.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Jamie J Atala can be reached at (571) 272-7384. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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JUSTIN W. RIDER
Primary Patent Examiner
Art Unit 2486
/Justin W Rider/Primary Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2486