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 .
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.
Claims 2 and 12 are 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.
Claims 2 and 12 contradict claims 1 and 11 respectively. Both claims 1 and 11 require that the first sub image is lower in definition than the target image. Claims 2 and 12 require that the resolution of the second image is lower than the first image. Correction is required.
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, 7-15 and 17-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Katz et al (2024/0267627) in view of OOISHI et al (2021/0272293).
Regarding claims 1, 11 and 20, Katz discloses A system and method of image display, comprising: obtaining a first image (paragraph 15); determining a target area and a non-target area (Region of interest called POI is considered the target area), wherein the target area is an estimated result of an area with eye gaze (paragraph 76 where user gaze is used to determine ROI) when the first image is displayed on a screen of a terminal device (camera images are displayed on screen 440), and the non-target area is an estimated result of an area without eye gaze when the first image is displayed on the screen of the terminal device (see paragraph 84 where non target (ROI) is lower resolution); obtaining a first sub-image and a second sub-image based on the first image (figure 3B), wherein the first sub-image and the second sub-image are stored in different buffers, the first sub-image corresponds to both the target area and the non-target area (324 and paragraph 81 where both target and non target are in lower resolution), and the second sub-image corresponds to the target area (322); and displaying the first sub-image and the second sub-image on the screen of the terminal device, to cause image definition in the non-target area to be lower than image definition in the target area (paragraph 81).
Katz et al fail to teach the separate buffers required in the claims, however OOISHI does. (see paragraphs 198-205 and figures 18-20). Since it is well understood in the art that areas of an image can be extracted out for separate storage and processing, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to use the processing structure of OOISHI in Katz’s system. The motivation for doing so would be to have different processors perform different functions in parallel, thus producing faster processing times.
As for claims 2 and 12, Katz teaches obtaining the first sub-image and the second sub-image based on the first image comprises: decreasing a resolution of the first image to obtain the first sub-image, wherein a resolution of the first sub-image is lower than the resolution of the first image (starting at paragraph 56 lower resolution is defined as lower than full resolution ); storing the first sub-image in a first buffer; cropping the first image based on the target area to obtain the second sub-image (note second sub image (ROI) can be cropped or not capturing non target paragraph 84 and paragraph 113), and wherein before displaying the first sub-image and the second sub-image on the screen of the terminal device, the method further comprises: extracting the first sub-image from the first buffer and extracting the second sub-image from the second buffer (Fusing images in step 314 require that images are extracted from memory).
As for claims 3 and 13, Katz in paragraph 113 discloses the resolution of the first image is (w, h), the resolution of the first sub-image is (w/m, h/m), and the resolution of the second sub-image is (w/n, h/n), wherein m is a parameter determined based on a compression requirement for the first image, n is a parameter determined based on a ratio of a size of the first image to a size of the target area, w, h, m, n, w/m, h/m, w/n, and h/n are positive integers, and both m and n are greater than or equal to 2. Also note the compression can be variable in that Katz discloses binning in different amounts (paragraph 56+) as well as not sampling the background at all. (see paragraph 84)
Regarding claims 4 and 14 Katz teaches displaying the first sub-image and the second sub-image on the screen of the terminal device comprises: stretching the first sub-image based on a target stretch coefficient; and displaying the second sub-image and the stretched first sub-image on the screen of the terminal device (paragraph 113 where the image is stretched to fit the requirements of publishing).
As for claims 5 and 15, Katz discloses a system and method, wherein displaying the first sub-image and the second sub-image on the screen of the terminal device comprises: synthesizing the first sub-image and the second sub-image, to obtain a frame image to be displayed (fusing images 314 is considered synthesizing); and displaying the frame image on the screen of the terminal device (440).
As for claims 7 and 17, Katz discloses a system and method wherein obtaining the first image comprises: obtaining a plurality of image layers that constitute the first image (Each Bin in the binning process could be considered a layer as we ll as note that Gaussian blurring is composed of layers); and synthesizing the plurality of image layers to obtain the first image.
Regarding claims 8 and 18, Katz shows the image definition in the non-target area to be lower than the image definition in the target area comprises: reducing image definition of the first sub-image, and keeping image definition of the second sub-image unchanged (paragraphs 81 and 56+ full resolution is considered unchanged).
As for claims 9 and 19, Katz shows wherein cropping the first image based on the target area to obtain the second sub-image comprises: projecting the target area on the first image (ROI is projected or requested a certain size paragraph 113); and cropping a projection area corresponding to the target area in the first image, to obtain the second sub-image.
Regarding claim 10, Katz discloses wherein an image layer of the second sub-image is located on an image layer of the first sub-image (see figure 3B, also if sub-image 2 is a portion of the whole image than it is located on the layer (slice or line) of the first image).
Claims 6 and 16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Katz et al in view of OOISHI et al as applied to claims 1-5, 7-15 and 17-20 above, and further in view of Stafford et al (2017/0287112).
As for claims 6 and 16, Katz and OOISHI teach the limitations of processing regions of interest separately, but they do not teach anti-aliasing on the sub images specifically. However, Stafford et al does discloses performing anti-aliasing on the second sub-image by a processor (paragraph 135); performing anti-aliasing on the first sub-image by a processor (paragraph 135); and synthesizing the first sub-image and the second sub-image that are subjected to anti-aliasing by the processor, to obtain the frame image to be displayed (figure 5 steps 508, 507P and figure 8). Since Stafford is in the same field of endeavor of creating an area of focus that is of higher resolution than the image areas not gazed at, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the time of filing to include anti-aliasing on sub images to ensure that data of two different resolution blends well. One would have been motivated to combine teachings to provide better looking images with the least amount of bandwidth used.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. 20030184561 Vorst is an example of early video processing to make the area of gaze higher resolution than areas not focused on.
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/CHRISTOPHER S KELLEY/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2482
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