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 .
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 22-28 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.
Claims 32-38 are allowed.
Claims 39-40 are currently rejected under 35 USC § 101, but are otherwise not subject to any prior art rejections under either 35 U.S.C. § 102 or 35 U.S.C. § 103. Assuming that the foregoing shortcomings of these claims were rectified by an amendment reciting a non-transitory memory, these claims would be allowable.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
With regards to claims 22 and 32, several of the features of these claims were known in the art as evidenced by Zaheer et al (US PG Pub. No. 2015/0009359), which anticipates parent claim 21 and teaches all but one of the limitations of claim 32. See the rejection of claim 21, discussed below. However, Zaheer does not disclose the operations further comprise searching the image store for an image with a corresponding capture location that is within a threshold distance of a target capture location of the target image using at least one of location coordinates, camera pose information, or place name information or that the other image that corresponds to the target image includes the image with the corresponding capture location that is within the threshold distance of the target capture location of the target image.
With regards to claims 23-25 and 33-38, these claims depend from claims 22 and 32, respectively, and therefore incorporate the features of those claims that were found allowable.
With regards to claim 26 and 39, several of the features of these claims were known in the art as evidenced by Zaheer et al (US PG Pub. No. 2015/0009359), which anticipates parent claim 21 and teaches all but one of the limitations of claim 32. See the rejection of claim 21, discussed below. However, Zaheer does not disclose the operations further comprise searching the image store for an image that contains first content that matches second content contained in the target image or that the other image that corresponds to the target image includes the image that contains the first content that matches the second content contained in the target image.
With regards to claims 27-28 and 40, these claims depend from claims 26 and 39, respectively, and therefore incorporate the features of those claims that were found allowable.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims 39-40 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to non-statutory subject matter. The claim(s) does/do not fall within at least one of the four categories of patent eligible subject matter because this claim recites “memory.” The term “memory” is not defined in the specification. The specification discloses embodiments of “memory” such as volatile memory 404, and a non-volatile storage device 406. (Spec., ¶¶ [0053]-[0057]). However, the examples of memory provided by the specification do not limit the scope of the phrase “memory.” The broadest reasonable interpretation of “memory” is synonymous with “computer readable media” and covers forms of non-transitory tangible media and transitory propagating signals per se in view of the ordinary and customary meaning of computer readable media, particularly when the specification is silent. See MPEP 2111.01. When the broadest reasonable interpretation of a claim covers a signal per se, the claim must be rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 101 as covering non-statutory subject matter. See Subject Matter Eligibility of Computer Readable Media, 1351 OG 212 (26 Jan 2010).
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.
Claims 21, 29 and 31 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Zaheer et al (US PG Pub. No. 2015/0009359).
With regards to claim 21, Zaheer discloses a memory and a processor coupled to the memory that stores instructions for performing the step of its invention at: ¶ [0042]; ¶ [0044].
Zaheer discloses receiving a target image that includes a region of interest along with a first request (e.g., “larger image is desired”) for conversion possibility information at: ¶ [0072]; to wit: “Once a first image has been taken by pressing the camera button 1002, the processing on the acquired image may start automatically while the user prepares to take further images. FIG. 11 shows an interface 1100 to be used by the next photographer, who can see the image and/or features from the image or images taken by the previous photographer overlaid on the current live feed. The overlay helps the next photographer in aligning the live feed with the previous photograph…” See, also FIG. 11a. See, also: ¶ [0076]; ¶ [0088] and FIGS. 17a and 17b; ¶¶ [0090]-[0091](“region of interest”); ¶ [0086](“In cases when the corners of most of the warped images are beyond 15 percent of the original image corners, the system determines that a larger image is desired through a collaborative photography session.”)
Zaheer discloses accessing an image store to select another image (e.g., “base reference image” that corresponds to the target image in response to receiving the target image that includes the region of interest along with the first request for the conversion possibility information at: ¶¶ [0064]-[0068](“In some implementations of the present invention, the final composite image is created by selecting already existing images in storage… The live view of this collaborating photographer will have an option of having the features from the image taken by the previous photographer being overlaid on the camera live feed. The overlay feature will help in aligning the next image with the previous image…”); ¶ [0074](“The preview 1102 indicates that the previous image is already acquired and the current image can be aligned with the previous image.”).
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Zaheer discloses generating the conversion possibility information (i.e., information that makes conversion possible; e.g., “image overlays”), wherein the conversion possibility information indicates that the target image can be converted into a stitched image that has a larger field of view than the target image by stitching the other image together with at least an original portion of the target image that includes the region of interest at: ¶ [0068]; ¶¶ [0071]-[0073](“In some cases, the camera can also be moved to capture and include other scene parts, resulting in a larger coverage of scene… [T]he multiple images are not the same view of the scene; instead they are partially overlapping images such that each new image covers or captures an additional part of the scene.”); [0076]-[0079], [0081], [0083]-[0084], [0086], ¶¶ [0090]-[0092](“region of interest”); and FIGS. 11a-11e; FIGS. 15A-15C. ¶ [0073]. In particular, see FIG. 11e:
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Zaheer discloses causing the conversion possibility information (i.e., information that makes conversion possible; e.g., “image overlays”) to be displayed along with an associated selector and receiving, based on a selection of the associated selector (e.g., “pressing the camera button 1002”), a second request to convert the target image into the stitched image at: ¶ [0068](“Once the current photographer has aligned and acquired the image, the algorithm then performs the automatic alignment, stitching and blending to create a final composite image”); ¶¶ [0088]-[0092]
Zaheer discloses causing the stitched image to be displayed in response to receiving the second request to convert the target image into the stitched image at ¶ [0075](“FIGS. 14a and 14b show an interface 1400 presenting final images obtained by combining images taken by multiple photographers... Furthermore, button 1302 allows the user to switch to the editing interface 600 for image editing. This interface also allows multiple options of sharing the generated digital content, such as buttons 1402 and 1403 which facilitate sharing on Twitter and Facebook respectively.”) See, also, FIGS. 14A & 14B; ¶¶ [0047]-[0048].
With regards to claim 29, Zaheer discloses the conversion possibility information is generated based on metadata information associated with the target image at ¶ [0068]; to wit: “[T]he directional aid is in the form of visual indicators, such as arrows on the screen. Such visual indicators can be obtained through utilizing metadata such as GPS information associated with the previous image…”
With regards to claim 31, Zaheer discloses the stitched image is caused to be displayed with a visual differentiator (e.g., “border 1701”) that visually differentiates the original portion of the target image from the other image at ¶ [0088] and FIGS. 17a and 17b.
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 30 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zaheer et al (US PG Pub. No. 2015/0009359) in view of OFFICIAL NOTICE.
With regards to claim 30, Zaheer discloses metadata information associated with a target image at ¶ [0068], but does not disclose the metadata information includes time information associated with the target image. However, this limitation was known in the art:
OFFICIAL NOTICE is hereby taken that, at the effective filing date of the present application, metadata information that includes time information (i.e., time of capture) associated with a target image was known in the art. At the time of the filing of the present application, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to use images having metadata comprising time of capture information, as was known in the art, when using images for the method according to Zaheer. The motivation for doing so comes from the prior art wherein one of ordinary skill in the art would understand that time of capture metadata is customarily included in image metadata and they would further understand that there would be no need to scrub time of capture information from the metadata. Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine the knowledge of the art with Zaheer to obtain the invention specified in this claim.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DAVID F DUNPHY whose telephone number is (571)270-1230. The examiner can normally be reached 9 am - 5 pm.
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/DAVID F DUNPHY/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2673
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