DETAILED ACTION
1. This communication is being filed in response to the submission having a mailing date of (01/08/2025) in which a three (3) month Shortened Statutory Period for Response has been set.
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
2. The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Acknowledgements
3. Upon initial entry, claim (1 -20) appears pending, of which claims (1, 9 and 17) are the three (3) parallel running independent claims on record.
Information Disclosure Statement
4. The Information Disclosure Statement (IDS) that were submitted on date 07/21/2025, (2 papers) are PARTIALLY in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the IDS’s have been considered by the examiner.
4.1. Multiple entries from the IDS(s) have been discarded, for failure to cite the relevant pages in the publication. Each of the submitted publications must comply with the 37 CFR 1.98 provisions, in order evaluate the corresponded information listed, to be considered by the Office. See also MPEP [37 CFR 1.98(b); - Each publication must be identified by publisher, author (if any), title, relevant pages of the publication, and date and place of the publication.]
Specification
5. The lengthy specification has not been checked to the extent necessary to determine the presence of all possible minor errors. Applicant's cooperation is requested in correcting any errors of which applicant may become aware in the specification.
Drawings
6. The submitted Drawings dated on (10/30/2024) has been accepted and considered under the 37 CFR 1.121 (d).
Double Patenting
7. The nonstatutory double patenting rejection is based on a judicially created doctrine grounded in public policy (a policy reflected in the statute) so as to prevent the unjustified or improper timewise extension of the “right to exclude” granted by a patent and to prevent possible harassment by multiple assignees. A nonstatutory obviousness-type double patenting rejection is appropriate where the conflicting claims are not identical, but at least one examined application claim is not patentably distinct from the reference claim(s) because the examined application claim is either anticipated by, or would have been obvious over, the reference claim(s). See, e.g. In re Berg, 140 F.3d 1428, 46 USPQ2d 1226 (Fed. Cir. 1998); In re Goodman, 11 F.3d 1046, 29 USPQ2d 2010 (Fed. Cir. 1993); In re Longi, 759 F.2d 887, 225 USPQ 645 (Fed. Cir. 1985); In re Van Ornum, 686 F.2d 937, 214 USPQ 761 (CCPA 1982); In re Vogel, 422 F.2d 438, 164 USPQ 619 (CCPA 1970); and In re Thorington, 418 F.2d 528, 163 USPQ 644 (CCPA 1969).
7.1. A timely filed terminal disclaimer in compliance with 37 CFR 1.321(c) or 1.321(d) may be used to overcome an actual or provisional rejection based on a nonstatutory double patenting ground provided the conflicting application or patent either is shown to be commonly owned with this application, or claims an invention made as a result of activities undertaken within the scope of a joint research agreement. Effective January 1, 1994, a registered attorney or agent of record may sign a terminal disclaimer. A terminal disclaimer signed by the assignee must fully comply with 37 CFR 3.73(b).
7.2. Individuals associated with the filing and prosecution of the instant patent application have a duty to disclose information within their knowledge as to other copending United States applications which are "material to patentability" of the application in question. See MPEP §2001.06(b) for more details.
7.3. Independent claims (1, 9 and 17) and the associated dependencies of instant 18/932,496, also directed to a Method, Device and CRM of the same, being provisionally rejected on the ground of nonstatutory obvious-type double patenting as being unpatentable over the analogous device/method claims of the parent Appl. 17/146,349, (US 11,575,928 B2) and 18/155,641 (US 12167,027 B2). Although the conflicting claims are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other, because the claims use similar inventive step/scope methodology, and/or variations of the same claim language. See below reference Table for more details;
Instant Application:
18/932,496
Reference: 17/146,349,
(now US 11,575,928 B2).
Reference: 18/155,641
(now US 12167,027 B2).
Claim 1. (New) A decoding method, comprising:
in response to an affine inter mode for a current coding block, parsing a bitstream to obtain an index, wherein the index is used to indicate a target candidate motion vector group of the current coding block;
determining the target candidate motion vector group in a candidate motion vector predictor list based on the index, wherein the target candidate motion vector group represents motion vector predictors of a group of control points of the current coding block, the affine candidate motion vector list comprises at least a first candidate motion vector group, the first candidate motion vector group is obtained based on a first group of control points of a first neighboring affine coding block of the current coding block, and the first group of control points of the first neighboring affine coding block are control points determined based on a relative location of a coding tree unit CTU with respect to the current coding block, wherein the first neighboring affine coding block is located in the CTU; obtaining a new candidate motion vector group based on motion vector difference MVDs obtained from the bitstream through parsing and the target candidate motion vector group indicated by the index; and obtaining the motion vectors of the one or more sub-blocks of the current coding block based on the new candidate motion vector group; and predicting the predicted sample value of the current coding block based on the motion vectors of the one or more sub-blocks of the current coding block.
Claim 9. (New) A video data decoding device, comprising: a memory, configured to store video data in a form of a bitstream; and a video decoder, configured to :in response to an affine inter mode for a current coding block, parse the bitstream to obtain an index, wherein the index is used to indicate a target candidate motion vector group of the current coding block; determine the target candidate motion vector group in a candidate motion vector predictor list based on the index, wherein the target candidate motion vector group represents motion vector predictors of a group of control points of the current coding block, the affine candidate motion vector list comprises at least a first candidate motion vector group, the first candidate motion vector group is obtained based on a first group of control points of a first neighboring affine coding block of the current coding block, and the first group of control points of the first neighboring affine coding block are control points determined based on a relative location of a coding tree unit CTU with respect to the current coding block, wherein the first neighboring affine coding block is located in the CTU; obtain a new candidate motion vector group based on motion vector difference MVDs obtained from the bitstream through parsing and the target candidate motion vector group indicated by the index; and obtain the motion vectors of the one or more sub-blocks of the current coding block based on the new candidate motion vector group; and; predict the predicted sample value of the current coding block based on the motion vectors of the one or more sub-blocks of the current coding block.
Claim 17. (New) A non-transitory computer-readable media storing computer instructions, that when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations, the operations comprising: in response to an affine inter mode for a current coding block, parsing a bitstream to obtain an index, wherein the index is used to indicate a target candidate motion vector group of the current coding block; determining the target candidate motion vector group in a candidate motion vector predictor list based on the index, wherein the target candidate motion vector group represents motion vector predictors of a group of control points of current coding block, the affine candidate motion vector list comprises at least a first candidate motion vector group, the first candidate motion vector group is obtained based on a first group of control points of a first neighboring affine coding block of the current coding block, and the first group of control points of the first neighboring affine coding block are control points determined based on a relative location of a coding tree unit CTU with respect to the current coding block, wherein the first neighboring affine coding block is located in the CTU; obtaining a new candidate motion vector group based on motion vector difference MVDs obtained from the bitstream through parsing and the target candidate motion vector group indicated by the index; and obtaining the motion vectors of the one or more sub-blocks of the current coding block based on the new candidate motion vector group; and; predicting the predicted sample value of the current coding block based on the motion vectors of the one or more sub-blocks of the current coding block.
Claim 17. A video data encoding device, comprising:
at least one processor; and one or more memories coupled to the at least one processor and storing programming instructions for execution by the at least one processor to cause the encoding device to:
determine a target candidate motion vector group in an affine candidate motion vector list according to a rate-distortion cost criterion,
wherein the target candidate motion vector group represents motion vector predictors of a group of control points of a current coding block, the affine candidate motion vector list comprises at least a first candidate motion vector group,
the first candidate motion vector group is obtained based on a first group of control points of a first neighboring affine coding block of the current coding block, and
the first group of control points of the first neighboring affine coding block are control points determined based on a relative location of a coding tree unit CTU with respect to the current coding block,
wherein the first neighboring affine coding block is located in the CTU; and encode an index corresponding to the target candidate motion vector group into a to-be-transmitted bitstream.
Claim 32. A non-transitory computer-readable media storing computer instructions, that when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform the steps of determining a target candidate motion vector group in an affine candidate motion vector list according to a rate-distortion cost criterion,
wherein the target candidate motion vector group represents motion vector predictors of a group of control points of a current coding block, the affine candidate motion vector list comprises at least a first candidate motion vector group, the first candidate motion vector group is obtained based on a first group of control points of a first neighboring affine coding block of the current coding block, and the first group of control points of the first neighboring affine coding block are control points determined based on a relative location of a coding tree unit CTU with respect to the current coding block, wherein the first neighboring affine coding block is located in the CTU; and encoding an index corresponding to the target candidate motion vector group into a to-be-transmitted bitstream.
Claim 33. A non-transitory storage medium comprising a bitstream encoded by performing the steps of:
determining a target candidate motion vector group in an affine candidate motion vector list according to a rate-distortion cost criterion,
wherein the target candidate motion vector group represent motion vector predictors of a group of control points of a current coding block, the affine candidate motion vector list comprises at least a first candidate motion vector group,
the first candidate motion vector group is obtained based on a first group of control points of a first neighboring affine coding block of the current coding block, and
the first group of control points of the first neighboring affine coding block are control points determined based on a relative location of a coding tree unit CTU with respect to the current coding block, wherein the first neighboring affine coding block is located in the CTU;
and encoding an index corresponding to the target candidate motion vector group into the bitstream.
Claim 1. An encoding method, comprising:
determining a target candidate motion vector group in an affine candidate motion vector list according to a rate-distortion cost criterion,
wherein the target candidate motion vector group represents motion vector predictors of a group of control points of a current coding block,
the affine candidate motion vector list comprises at least a first candidate motion vector group,
the first candidate motion vector group is obtained based on a first group of control points of a first neighboring affine coding block of the current coding block,
and the first group of control points of the first neighboring affine coding block are control points determined based on a relative location of a coding tree unit (CTU) with respect to the current coding block,
wherein the first neighboring affine coding block is located in the CTU; wherein an affine inter mode is applied for the current coding block,
determining motion vector differences (VDs) of the group of control points between the target candidate motion vector group and motion vectors of the group of control points; and
encoding the VDs of the group of control points and an index corresponding to the target candidate motion vector group into a to-be-transmitted bitstream.
Claim 12. A video data encoding device, comprising: a memory, configured to store video data in a form of a bitstream; and a video encoder, configured to: determine a target candidate motion vector group in an affine candidate motion vector list according to a rate-distortion cost criterion,
wherein the target candidate motion vector group represents motion vector predictors of a group of control points of a current coding block, the affine candidate motion vector list comprises at least a first candidate motion vector group,
the first candidate motion vector group is obtained based on a first group of control points of a first neighboring affine coding block of the current coding block, and the first group of control points of the first neighboring affine coding block are control points determined based on a relative location of a coding tree unit (CTU) with respect to the current coding block, wherein the first neighboring affine coding block is located in the CTU; wherein an affine inter mode is applied for the current coding block, and determine motion vector differences (MVDs) of the group of control points between the target candidate motion vector group and motion vectors of the group of control points; and encode the MVDs of the group of control points and an index corresponding to the target candidate motion vector group into a to-be-transmitted bitstream.
Claim 21. (New) A non-transitory computer-readable media storing computer instructions, that when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations, the operations comprising:
determining a target candidate motion vector group in an affine candidate motion vector list according to a rate-distortion cost criterion, wherein the target candidate motion vector group represents motion vector predictors of a group of control points of a current coding block, the affine candidate motion vector list comprises at least a first candidate motion vector group, the first candidate motion vector group is obtained based on a first group of control points of a first neighboring affine coding block of the current coding block, and the first group of control points of the first neighboring affine coding block are control points determined based on a relative location of a coding tree unit (CTU) with respect to the current coding block, wherein the first neighboring affine coding block is located in the CTU; wherein an affine inter mode is applied for the current coding block, determining motion vector differences (MVDs) of the group of control points between the target candidate motion vector group and motion vectors of the group of control points; and encoding the MVDs of the group of control points and an index corresponding to the target candidate motion vector group into a to-be-transmitted bitstream.
Claim objection
8. Claims (1 -20) are objected to, because of the judicially created Double patent rejection (see section 7 above), but it may be considered for allowance if properly rewritten, with a timely file Terminal Disclaimer (TD) submitted, linking the two involved applications, in compliance with the 37 CFR 1.321(c) or 1.321(d).
Prior Art Citations
9. The following List of prior art, made of record and not relied upon, is/are considered
pertinent to applicant's disclosure:
9.1. Patent documentation:
US 11,805,272 B2 Poirier; et al. H04N19/56; H04N19/159; H04N19/147;
US 11,140,408 B2 Huang; Han et al. H04N19/52; H04N19/134; H04N19/136;
US 11,223,845 B2 Lee; Bae et al. H04N19/176; H04N19/86; H04N19/105;
US 10,798,394 B2 Zhou; et al. H04N19/513; H04N19/139; H04N19/52;
US 11,575,928 B2 Chen; et al. H04N19/50; H04N19/52; H04N19/51
US 10,681,370 B2 Chen; et al. H04N19/147; H04N19/105; H04N19/176;
9.2. Non-Patent Literature:
_ Study of the affine merge mode; July-2018.
_ Vector coding of the Affine MVD; July-2018.
CONCLUSIONS
10. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from Examiner
should be directed to LUIS PEREZ-FUENTES (luis.perez-fuentes@uspto.gov) whose phone
number is (571) 270 -1168. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday-Friday 8am-
5pm. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner's
supervisor, WILLIAM VAUGHN can be reached on (571) 272-3922. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is (571) 272 -3922.
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/LUIS PEREZ-FUENTES/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2481.