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 .
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
Election/Restrictions
Claims 2, 5, and 8-15 are withdrawn from further consideration pursuant to 37 CFR 1.142(b) as being drawn to nonelected species, there being no allowable generic or linking claim. Election was made without traverse in the reply filed on 3/2/2026.
Claim Interpretation
Claim 9 relates to a non-transitory computer-readable medium storing a bitstream a generated by a particular encoding method. Since the claims relate to a bitstream which is stored on a computer readable medium after all coding functions have been performed the bitstream no longer has any functional relationship with a processor or other machine, but instead relates to e.g. a video stored on a hard drive. The purpose of the stored bitstream is only to convey meaning to a human viewer of the coded bitstream and is thus non-functional descriptive material. Non-functional descriptive material used only to convey messages or meaning is given little patentable weight (See MPEP 2111.05). For the purposes of examination, the examiner will interpret the claim as relating only to a computer readable medium storing data.
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.
Claim 6 is 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 6 recites:
“wherein the second MV is generated based on at least one of the following:
.,,,,
a coordinate of a top-left point of the neighboring video block, or
wherein the second MV is generated by adding an offset to the first MV.”
The ‘or’ between the final two limitations of claim 6 indicates that the limitation relating to an offset is part of the listing of the alternative limitations in claim 6, however the separation using the term ‘wherein’ indicates that the limitation is not part of the alternative list and is instead an additional required limitation. The meets and bounds of the claim are unclear because it is unclear whether the final limitation relating to an offset is required by or merely an alternative limitation in claim 6. For the purposes of examination, the examiner will treat the final limitation as a required limitation for the sake of compact prosecution.
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.
(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 and 16-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Solovyev et al (2020/0351493).
In regard to claim 1 discloses a method for video processing, comprising:
obtaining, for a conversion between a current block of a video and a bitstream of the video, a first motion vector for a target video block (Solovyev pars 208-212 also note pars 6-8 inter prediction using merge or AMVP mode, in which a predicted motion vector is obtained for the current block), the target video block being determined by applying a sample adjusting process to a plurality of samples of the current video block (Solovyev Fig. 1 and pars 98-99 note video data is ‘adjusted’ using trimming, color format conversion, color correction and/or denoising by pre-processor 18);
adjusting the first MV based on a second MV generated for the target video block (Solovyev pars 6-8 and 208-212 note in AMVP mode a first, constructed, motion vector is adjusted using a second, motion estimated, motion vector, the adjustment based on the difference between the two motion vectors); and
performing the conversion based on the adjusted first MV (Solovyev Figs. 1-3 and generally pars 93-176 for ‘conversion’ or encoding and decoding of a current block, particularly note pars 153-157 and 166 for the use of motion vectors in the conversion).
In regard to claim 3 refer to the statements made in the rejection of claim 1 above. Solovyev further discloses that the information regarding how to generate the second MV is dependent on a prediction scheme sued for coding the target block (Solovyev pars 208-212 and 6-8 note generation of the second, motion estimated, motion vector is dependent upon selection of the AMVP mode as opposed to a merge mode also note par. 150-152 use of an intra prediction mode which does not use motion vectors).
In regard to claims 16 and 17 Solovyev further discloses that converting includes encoding and/or decoding (Solovyev Figs 1-3 note encoding and decoding)
Claims 18-19 describe an apparatus and computer readable medium storing instructions which perform process steps corresponding to claim 1 above. Refer to the statements made in regard to claim 1 above for the rejection of claims 18-19 which will not be repeated here for brevity. In particular regard to claims 18-19 Solovyev further discloses an apparatus including a processor and a non-transitory computer readable memory with instructions for implementing the claimed method steps (Solovyev Fig. 1B and par. 113).
In regard to claim 20 Solovyev further discloses storing a coded bitstream on a storage device (Solovyev pars 101 and 103).
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 (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 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) 4 and 6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Solovyev in view of Li et al (2021/0044824).
In regard to claim 4 refer to the statements made in the rejection of claim 1 above.
It is noted that Solovyev does not disclose details of conditions for generating the second MV. However, Li discloses an affine AMVP mode in which the generation of a second motion vector depends on both a height and width dimension of the target video bock (Li pars 120-130 note affine AMVP mode particularly note par. 127 note affine AVMP mode, and hence its associated motion vectors, are not used when the block has a width or height less than 16).
It is therefore considered obvious that one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention would recognize the advantage of including an affine AMVP mode as taught by LI in the prediction modes of Solovyev in order to model zoom, rotation, perspective and other irregular motions as suggested by LI (LI par. 113).
In regard to claim 6 refer to the statements made in the rejection of claim 1 above. Solovyev further discloses that the second MV is generated by adding an offset to the first MV (Solovyev pars 6-8 note the motion vector difference as an offset added to the motion vector predictor to obtain the estimated motion vector). LI further discloses that the second MV is generated based on coding information and a prediction scheme of a neighboring video block of the current block (LI pars 127-128 note determining the affine AVMP mode based on whether neighboring blocks are codded in an affine mode, and whether the neighboring blocks use the same reference picture as the current block).
Claim(s) 7 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Solovyev in view of Li as applied to claim 6 above, and in further view of Rusanovskyy et al (2020/0366924).
In regard to claim 7 it is noted that neither Solovyev nor LI disclose details of motion vector precision. However, Rusonovskyy discloses an AMVR technique in which the offset is the same as a precision of the first MV (Russanovskyy pars 120-122 particularly note par. 122 motion vector predictors are rounded to have the same precision as MVD values).
It is therefore considered obvious that one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention would recognize the advantage of incorporating the AMVR techniques taught by Russanovskyy in the invention of Solovyev in view of LI in order to allow CU motion to be coded with different precisions as suggested by Russanovskyy (Russanovskyy par. 120).
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
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US 20210409683 A1 Chen; Chun-Chi et al.
US 20210377523 A1 KAWAI; TAKURO et al.
US 20210021856 A1 ZHENG; Xiaozhen et al.
US 20210006798 A1 JANG; Hyeongmoon
US 20200389644 A1 WANG; Biao et al.
US 20200296395 A1 XU; Xiaozhong et al.
US 20200221092 A1 FRANCOIS; Edouard et al.
US 10621731 B1 Duenas; Alberto et al.
US 20180146208 A1 Hojati; Esmaeil et al.
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/JEREMIAH C HALLENBECK-HUBER/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2481