DETAILED ACTION
This office action is in response to the application filed on 10/14/2024. Claims 1-20 are pending and are examined.
EXAMINER’S NOTE: After careful review and consideration of the parent application(s), the parent application(s) are not given an obviousness type double patenting rejection because the instant application is narrower/differing in scope and/or includes non-obvious elements.
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
Acknowledgment is made of applicant’s claim for foreign priority under 35 U.S.C. 119 (a)-(d). The certified copy has been filed in parent Application No. 17882590, filed on 11/01/2022.
Claim Objections
Claims 3-5 and 14 is objected to because of the following informalities:
Claim 3 recites, “BV candidates from spatial neighbouring adjacent and/or non-adjacent blocks” without reciting in relation to what. Therefore, for purposes of examination, the limitation will be reasonably interpreted as either - - BV candidates from spatial neighbouring adjacent and/or non-adjacent blocks of the current video block - - or - - BV candidates from spatial neighbouring adjacent and/or non-adjacent blocks for the current video block - - .
Claim 4 recites, “only BV candidates from spatial neighbouring adjacent and/or non-adjacent blocks” without reciting in relation to what. Therefore, for purposes of examination, the limitation will be reasonably interpreted as either - - only BV candidates from spatial neighbouring adjacent and/or non-adjacent blocks of the current video block - - or - - only BV candidates from spatial neighbouring adjacent and/or non-adjacent blocks for the current video block - - .
Claim 5 recites, “BV candidates from spatial neighbouring blocks” without reciting in relation to what. Therefore, for purposes of examination, the limitation will be reasonably interpreted as either - - BV candidates from spatial neighbouring blocks of the current video block - - or - - BV candidates from spatial neighbouring blocks for the current video block - - .
Regarding Claim 14, “AMVP” should be spelled out when first introduced.
Examiner notes that since these are suggestions, Applicant is invited to amend these above limitations in any similar way to overcome the objections.
Examiner respectfully requests from Applicant verification and requires appropriate correction regarding these matters.
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)(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 20 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by Xu et al., US Patent Application Publication No.: 2020/0120334 A1, hereby Xu.
Claim 20 is directed to a non-transitory computer-readable recording medium storing a bitstream. Significantly, the claimed non-transitory computer readable recording medium is merely memory with non-functional descriptive material and is NOT implementing any actual method; no instructions/steps are being executed. Instead, the claimed storage medium merely stores the data output from and/or generated by a series of acts. In other words, the claims are directed to a mere machine-readable medium storing data content.
Applicant therefore seeks to patent the storage of a bitstream in the abstract. In other words, the claim seeks to patent the content of the information (bitstream comprising video information) and not the process itself. Moreover, this stored bitstream does not impose any definitive physical organization on the data as there is no functional relationship between the bitstream and the storage medium. Overall, Claim 20 and any claims depending therefrom are directed to mere data content (bitstream generated by a series of acts) stored as a bitstream on a computer readable recording medium. Under MPEP 2111.05(III), such claims are merely machine-readable media. Furthermore, the Examiner found and continues to find that there is no disclosed or claimed functional relationship between the stored data and medium. Instead, the medium is merely a support or carrier for the data being stored. Therefore, the data stored and the way such data is generated should not be given patentable weight. See MPEP 2111.05 applying In re Lowry, 32 F.3d 1579, 1583-84, 32 USPQ2d 1031, 1035 (Fed. Cir. 1994) and In re Ngai, 367 F.3d 1336, 70 USPQ2d 1862 (Fed. Cir. 2004). As such, this claim is subject to a prior art rejection based on any non-transitory computer readable media known before the earliest effective filing date of the present application. Therefore, Claim 20 is anticipated by Xu, in which Xu discloses the following:
“A non-transitory computer-readable recording medium storing a bitstream (see Xu, Figs. 1-3 and 4-7, and [0131], [0144]-[0145], and [0169]; Fig. 14)...”
EXAMINER’S NOTE: Applicant has not used the standard non-transitory CRM (non-transitory computer-readable media) claim formats of a) a non-transitory computer-readable medium storing executable instructions that, when implemented by a processor, perform an encoding/decoding method [steps of encoding/decoding method] or a b) non-transitory computer readable medium storing instructions that, when executed by a computer, cause it to perform a specified method that was held to recite patent-eligible product under 35 USC 101 by In re Beauregard, 53 F.3d 1583 (Fed. Cir. 1995) and endorsed by the USPTO in 77 Fed. Reg. 74618 (Dec. 16, 2014), 2014 Interim Guidance on Patent Subject Matter Eligibility Examples: Abstract Ideas at 1-3, 8-10.
However, such standard non-transitory CRM claim formats that recite execution/implementation of a method are not subject to a non-functional descriptive material claim interpretation because such a claimed media does not merely store output data but instead stores functional, method steps that have a functional relationship with the media.
Therefore, the examiner suggests either canceling the claim(s) or amending the claim(s) to a standard non-transitory CRM format.
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 1-5, 14, and 17-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Xu, in view of Lee, US Patent Application Publication No.: 2021/0297657 A1, hereby Lee.
Xu discloses the invention substantially as claimed. Regarding Claims 1 and 17-20, Xu discloses a method for video processing, an apparatus for processing video data comprising a processor and a non-transitory memory with instructions thereon, and a non-transitory computer-readable recording medium storing a bitstream of a video which is generated by a method performed by a video processing apparatus (Figs. 1-3; Figs. 4-7; Fig. 14), comprising:
“determining, for a conversion between a current video block of a video and a bitstream of the video, one or more block vector (BV) candidates for the current video block based on a merge estimation . . . the current video block (Fig. 14, [0100] and [0128]-[0130]; Figs. 1-3 and 4-7, disclosing the structural features of a video encoder/decoder);
adding the one or more BV candidates to a BV list associated with the current video block (Fig. 14, [0100] and [0128]-[0130]; Figs. 1-3 and 4-7); and
performing the conversion based on the BV list (Fig. 14, [0100] and [0128]-[0130]; Figs. 1-3 and 4-7, disclosing the structural features of a video encoder/decoder).”
However, although Xu suggests the claimed merge estimation region (MER), Lee does expressly disclose the following:
“determining, block . . . candidates for the current video block based on a merge estimation region (MER) covering the current video block (Figs. 1-2 and 23-24, and [0272]-[0281], visually disclosing merge candidates within the same MER covering the current block and also merge candidates outside the MER covering the current block); . . .”
Accordingly, before the effective filing date, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, having the teachings of Xu and Lee (hereby Xu-Lee), to modify the method, apparatus, and non-transitory computer-readable recording medium storing for processing video data of Xu to use the claimed merge estimation region (MER) as in Lee. The motivation for doing so would have been to create the advantage of improving the efficiency of prediction (see Lee, [0016]-[0018]; Figs. 1-2 and 23-24, and [0272]-[0281]).
Regarding Claim 2, Xu-Lee discloses:
“wherein the current video block is an intra block copy (IBC) coded block (Xu, Fig. 14, [0100] and [0128]-[0130], disclosing IBC mode; Figs. 1-3 and 4-7).”
Regarding Claim 3, Xu-Lee discloses:
“wherein BV candidates (Xu, Fig. 14, [0100] and [0128]-[0130]; Figs. 1-3 and 4-7) from spatial neighbouring adjacent and/or non-adjacent blocks that are under the MER are not added (Lee, Figs. 1-2 and 23-24, and [0272]-[0281], visually disclosing merge candidates within the same MER covering the current block (i.e., unavailable candidates) and also merge candidates outside the MER covering the current block (i.e., available candidates)) to the BV list (Xu, Fig. 14, [0100] and [0128]-[0130]; Figs. 1-3 and 4-7).”
The motivation that was utilized in Claims 1and 17-20 applies equally as well here.
Regarding Claim 4, Xu-Lee discloses:
“wherein only BV candidates (Xu, Fig. 14, [0100] and [0128]-[0130]; Figs. 1-3 and 4-7) from spatial neighbouring adjacent and/or non-adjacent blocks that are outside the MER, and/or BV candidates from an IBC history-based motion vector prediction (HMVP) table, and/or default BV candidates are added (Lee, Figs. 1-2 and 23-24, and [0272]-[0281], visually disclosing merge candidates within the same MER covering the current block (i.e., unavailable candidates) and also merge candidates outside the MER covering the current block (i.e., available candidates)) to the BV list (Xu, Fig. 14, [0100] and [0128]-[0130]; Figs. 1-3 and 4-7).”
The motivation that was utilized in Claims 1and 17-20 applies equally as well here.
Regarding Claim 5, Xu-Lee discloses:
“wherein the BV candidates (Xu, Fig. 14, [0100] and [0128]-[0130]; Figs. 1-3 and 4-7) from spatial neighbouring blocks are not added (Lee, Figs. 1-2 and 23-24, and [0272]-[0281], visually disclosing merge candidates within the same MER covering the current block (i.e., unavailable candidates) and also merge candidates outside the MER covering the current block (i.e., available candidates)) to the BV list (Xu, Fig. 14, [0100] and [0128]-[0130]; Figs. 1-3 and 4-7).”
The motivation that was utilized in Claims 1and 17-20 applies equally as well here.
Regarding Claim 14, Xu-Lee discloses:
“wherein the BV list (Xu, Fig. 14, [0100] and [0128]-[0130]; Figs. 1-3 and 4-7) refers to an IBC AMVP list and/or an IBC merge list associated with the current video block (Lee, Figs. 1-2 and 23-24, and [0272]-[0281]; Fig. 29, and [0327]-[0330], disclosing utilizing IBC merge candidate list).”
Accordingly, before the effective filing date, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, having the teachings of Xu-Lee, to modify the method, apparatus, and non-transitory computer-readable recording medium storing for processing video data of Xu to use the claimed IBC merge list associated with the current video block as in Lee. The motivation for doing so would have been to create the advantage of improving the efficiency of prediction relating to intra block copy mode (see Lee, [0016]-[0018]; Figs. 1-2 and 23-24, and [0272]-[0281]; Fig. 29, and [0327]-[0330]).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 6-13 and 15-16 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
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure:
Examiner notes that multiple references cited disclose merge processing and MER processing in video coding. For example, the following references show similar features in the claims, although not relied upon: Pang (US 2015/0271515 A1), [0102]; Chen (US 2021/0160528 A1), Fig. 28.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to KATHLEEN M WALSH whose telephone number is (571)270-0423. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8:00 AM - 5:00 PM.
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/KATHLEEN M WALSH/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2482