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 11/04/2024 was filed after the mailing date of the application. The submission is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
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 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.
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.
Claims 1 and 10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Beier et al. (US. Patent App. Pub. No. 2022/0006989, “Beier”, hereinafter) in view of Atsuchi (US. Patent App. Pub. No. 2024/0013689).
As per claim 1, Beier teaches a projection method comprising:
establishing a projection map of an environmental space according to at least one displacement vector and at least one deflection angle of a projector (¶ [60-67], “…2D points in the projector space are mapped onto 2D displacement vectors in a previously defined 2D tangential space of the projection surface”, the deflection angle is interpreted as the viewing angle of the camera on the projection surface. See further Fig. 13, ¶ [167]);
identifying at least one feature position point in the environmental space by using a distance sensor (see further Tan addressed below. Beier does teach measuring the distance of a point Q to the camera (see Fig. 14, ¶ [168-170]);
updating the projection map for generating a projection feature map according to the at least one feature position point (¶ [133], aligning and adjusting the projectors based on the correction points ¶ [57-60]); and
calibrating a projection surface projected by the projector for compensating distortions of the projection surface (see ¶ [102], and also ¶ [135-137]).
Beier does not expressly teach identifying at least one feature position point in the environmental space by using a distance sensor (It is noted that how the distance sensor is used to identify the feature point is not clear). Beier does, however, teach identifying the feature points as addressed above.
Atsuchi teaches a very similar method of calibrating the projection surface of projector system (see Fig. 1 and 10, ¶ [48-51]), wherein the method further includes a distance sensor to identify the object image (¶ [65]).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the method as taught by Atsuchi into the method as taught by Beier as addressed above, the advantage of which is for measuring distance from the projector to the surface.
As per claim 10, the combined Beier-Atsuchi further teaches:
partitioning the projection surface into a plurality of regions (Beier, Fig. 2, ¶ [103]);
acquiring line feature point information of each region of the plurality of regions (Beier, ¶ [112]);
setting a weight corresponding to the line feature point information of the each (sic) region (Beier, ¶ [71-72]);
acquiring a zone having a maximum weight from the projection surface according to a plurality of weights corresponding to the plurality of regions (Beier, ¶ [71-73], i.e., area with less error measurement points); and
determining the zone having the maximum weight as a topic projection surface (Beier, Fig. 13, ¶ [164-167], and also ¶ [172]). Thus, claim 10 would have been obvious over the combined references for the reason above.
Claims 2-4, 7, 11-14, 17, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Beier et al. (US. Patent App. Pub. No. 2022/0006989) in view of Atsuchi (US. Patent App. Pub. No. 2024/0013689) further in view of Bassi et al. (US. Patent App. Pub. No. 2018/0196336, “Bassi”).
As per claim 2, as addressed, the combined teachings of Beier and Atsuchi also include wherein establishing the projection map of the environment space according to the at least one displacement vector and the at least one deflection angle of the projector comprises:
setting a starting point (Beier, Fig. 8 and 9, such as point Q1);
acquiring three-dimensional displacement vectors in the environmental space by moving the projector in the environmental space from the starting point (Beier, ¶ [142-144], shifting the measurement point Q1 to Q1’, which has X, Y and Z coordinates);
acquiring three-dimensional deflection angles in the environmental space (as addressed in claim 1)
The combined Beier-Atsuchi does not expressly teach acquiring three-dimensional deflection angles by rotating the projector in the environmental space at the starting point; and
detecting a focal length between the projector and the projection surface by the distance sensor after the three-dimensional deflection angles and the three-dimensional displacement vectors are acquired.
However, in the same field of endeavor (see Abstract), Bassi teaches these features, i.e., acquiring three-dimensional deflection angles by rotating the projector in the environmental space at the starting point (¶ [6]); and detecting a focal length between the projector and the projection surface by the distance sensor after the three-dimensional deflection angles and the three-dimensional displacement vectors are acquired (¶ [75-76]).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to apply the method as taught by Bassi to the combined Beier-Atsuchi method addressed above, the advantage of which is to correct distorted image (¶ [34]).
As per claim 3, as addressed in claim 2, the combined Beier-Atsuchi-Bassi does also teach:
detecting a set of three-dimensional displacement vectors corresponding to the projector in different moving directions (see Bassi, Fig. 5 and 6, ¶ [36], horizontal and vertical direction);
detecting a set of three-dimensional deflection angles corresponding to the projector at different rotation angles (Bassi, ¶ [37], rotation about the x axis);
detecting a plurality of focal lengths between the projection surface and the projector in the different moving directions and the different rotation angles after the set of three-dimensional displacement vectors and the set of three-dimensional deflection angles are acquired (Bassi, ¶ [43-45], calculating the focal length using the shifted points and rotational angles); and
establishing the projection map according to the set of three-dimensional displacement vectors, the set of three-dimensional deflection angles, and the plurality of focal lengths (Bassi, ¶ [77], computing correction transformation 180 referring to Fig. 4). Thus, claim 3 would have been obvious over the combined references for the reason above.
As per claim 4, the combined Beier-Atsuchi-Bassi does substantially teach wherein identifying the at least one feature position point in the environmental space by using the distance sensor comprises:
moving the distance sensor along a horizontal direction in the environmental space for continuously acquiring a plurality of horizontal tilt angles between the projector and the projection surface in the environmental space (Atsuchi, Fig. 5, ¶ [95-96]);
moving the distance sensor along a vertical direction in the environmental space for continuously acquiring a plurality of vertical tilt angles between the projector and the projection surface in the environmental space (Atsuchi, ¶ [97]);
acquiring a horizontal angle variation of the plurality of horizontal tilt angles;
acquiring a vertical angle variation of the plurality of vertical tilt angles (Atsuchi, ¶ [95-97], based on the turning angle of the head of the user); and
identifying the at least one feature position point in the environmental space according to the horizontal angle variation and the vertical angle variation (Atsuchi, Fig. 1, steps S22 and S23, ¶ [145], identifying the display position of the object based on the moving direction and the moving amount of the first range). Thus, claim 4 would have been obvious over the combined references for the reason above.
As per claim 7, the combined Beier-Atsuchi-Bassi does substantially teach wherein calibrating the projection surface projected by the projector for compensating the distortions of the projection surface comprises:
acquiring the at least one feature position point according to the projection feature map (as addressed in claim 1);
detecting a plurality of focal lengths between the projector and the projection surface (as addressed in claim 3) by performing multiple samples on a region of the at least one feature position point by the distance sensor (Atsuchi, ¶ [64]);
determining a physical feature of the projection surface (Bassi, ¶ [33], i.e., determining the vanishing point of the 3D real world) according to the at least one feature position point (addressed above) and the plurality of focal lengths (Bassi, ¶ [61]); and
calibrating the projection surface for compensating the distortions of the projection surface according to the physical feature (as addressed in claim 1). Thus, claim 7 would have been obvious over the combined references for the reason above.
As per claim 11, as addressed in claim 1, the combined Beier-Atsuchi teaches a projection system comprising:
a projection surface configured to display an image (Beier, Fig. 1-3, surface 3); and
a projector comprising:
a distance sensor configured to detect at least one focal length between the projector and the projection surface (see claim 2);
a memory configured to save data (Atsuchi, Fig. 2, ¶ [72]); and
a processor (280) coupled to the distance sensor (219) and the memory (recited above) (Atsuchi, Fig. 3);
wherein the processor establishes a projection map of an environmental space according to at least one displacement vector and at least one deflection angle of the projector (see claim 1),
the distance sensor identifies at least one feature position point in the environmental space (addressed in claim 1),
the processor updates the projection map for generating a projection feature map according to the at least one feature position point, the processor calibrates the projection surface projected by the projector for compensating distortions of the projection surface (also addressed in claim 1).
Although the combined references do not explicitly teach the projection map and the projection feature map are saved in the memory, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to do that at least temporarily for further processing.
Claim 12, which is similar in scope to claim 2 as addressed above, is thus rejected under the same rationale.
(It is noted the claimed accelerometer is implicitly taught because all the claimed functionalities are performed as addressed in claim 2).
Claim 13, which is similar in scope to claim 3 as addressed above, is thus rejected under the same rationale.
Claim 14, which is similar in scope to claim 4 as addressed above, is thus rejected under the same rationale.
Claim 17, which is similar in scope to claim 7 as addressed above, is thus rejected under the same rationale.
Claim 20, which is similar in scope to claim 10 as addressed above, is thus rejected under the same rationale.
Claims 8 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Beier et al. (US. Patent App. Pub. No. 2022/0006989) in view of Atsuchi (US. Patent App. Pub. No. 2024/0013689) further in view of Bassi et al. (US. Patent App. Pub. No. 2018/0196336), and further in view of Elran et al. (US. Patent App. Pub. No. 2022/0179052, “Elran”).
As per claim 8, as addressed above, the combined Beier-Atsuchi teaches:
acquiring a focal length or a relative position between the projector and the projection surface.
The combined Beier-Atsuchi does not expressly teach scaling an image of the projection surface or projecting a corresponding three-dimensional image by introducing three-dimensional projection depth information when the focal length or the relative position between the projector and the projection surface is changed.
Elran teaches a similar method of calibrating projection surface (see ¶ [12] and ¶ [14-15]), and further teaches the above features, i.e., scaling an image of the projection surface or projecting a corresponding three-dimensional image by introducing three-dimensional projection depth information (¶ [87], “…perform depth scanning of at least three points within the construction site and therefrom estimate a 3D model of at least one surface within the construction site… wherein the projection image is rendered at a scale corresponding to the dimensions of the at least one surface…”) when the focal length or the relative position between the projector and the projection surface is changed (¶ [85]).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to make use of the method as taught by Elran and apply to the method as taught by the combined Beier-Atsuchi as addressed above, the advantage of which is to account for the system's three-dimensional position and orientation within the build space (¶ [41]).
Claims 18 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Beier et al. (US. Patent App. Pub. No. 2022/0006989) in view of Atsuchi (US. Patent App. Pub. No. 2024/0013689), and further in view of Elran et al. (US. Patent App. Pub. No. 2022/0179052).
Claim 18, which is similar in scope to claim 8 as addressed above, is thus rejected under the same rationale.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 5-6, 9, and 15-16, and 19 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.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
The prior art taken singly or in combination does not teach or suggest, a projection method, among other things, comprising:
…when a sum of the horizontal angle variation and the vertical angle variation is greater than a threshold angle, the at least one feature position point includes a non-flat surface position point of the projection surface, and
when the sum of the horizontal angle variation and the vertical angle variation is smaller or equal to the threshold angle, the at least one feature position point includes a flat surface position point of the projection surface (claims 5 and 15); or
…partitioning the projection surface into a plurality of regions;
acquiring a reflectance value of each region of the plurality of regions;
acquiring a zone having a maximum reflectance from the projection surface according to a plurality of reflectance values corresponding to the plurality of regions; and
determining the zone having the maximum reflectance as a topic projection surface (claims 9 and 19).
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Hau H. Nguyen whose telephone number is: 571-272-7787. The examiner can normally be reached on MON-FRI from 8:30-5:30.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Tammy Goddard, can be reached on (571) 272-7773.
The fax number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/HAU H NGUYEN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2611
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