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 .
Response to Arguments
2. Applicant’s arguments filed on 06/01/2026 with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 1 have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of newly found prior art.
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.
Claims 1 and 5-6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Bae et al. (US 2022/0150471 A1) in view of RONDAO et al. (US 2025/0259335, hereinafter RONDAO; Prov. Application filed: April 21, 2022).
Regarding claim 1, Bae discloses a mesh decoding device comprising ([see in Fig. 1]- in FIG. 1, a video sequence, such as video sequence 108, may comprise a series of pictures (also referred to as frames. A video sequence may achieve the impression of motion when a constant or variable time is used to successively present pictures of the video sequence. A picture may comprise one or more sample arrays of intensity values)): a circuit that decodes a displacement bit stream to generate and output a displacement ([see in Fig. 22]- a method of decoding the displacement vector predictor when a video bitstream is encoded with the method described in FIG. 18 in accordance with embodiments of the present disclosure. In FIG. 22, the displacement vector predictor may be decoded based on the video bitstream, the first displacement vector), wherein the circuit: decodes a level value from the displacement bit stream([see in Fig. 19]- in FIG. 19 in accordance with embodiments of the present disclosure. In FIG. 23, the displacement vector predictor may decoded based on the video bitstream, the first displacement vector, and the second predictor candidate list); generates a transformed coefficient by inversely quantizing the level value ([see in Fig. 2para 0048; 0054]- quantization unit (TR+Q) unit 214, an inverse transform and quantization unit (iTR+iQ) 216).
However, Bae does not explicitly disclose generates the displacement by applying an inverse wavelet transform to the transformed coefficient.
In an analogous art, RONDAO discloses generates the displacement by applying an inverse wavelet transform to the transformed coefficient ([para 0111-0112]- perform the inverse wavelet transform and subdivision scheme used to apply decoded displacements and convert the Texture Attribute Map to the desired color format/space). Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to provide the technique of RONDAO to the modified system of Bae methods to improve quality of decoded mesh textures and geometry by using its hierarchical representation which as a consequence increases compression efficiency of the encoding pipeline [RONDAO; para 0048].
Regarding claim 5, the claim is interpreted and rejected for the same reason as set forth in claim 1. Hence; all limitations for claim 5 have been met in claim 1.
Regarding claim 6, the claim is interpreted and rejected for the same reason as set forth in claim 1. Hence; all limitations for claim 6 have been met in claim 1.
Claims 2-4 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Bae in view of RONDAO as applied to claim 1 above and further in view of Han; Woo-jin (US 2007/0110327 A1; hereinafter as Han).
Regarding claim 2, the combination of Bae and Shin do not explicitly disclose
an adder that calculates coded transformed coefficient by adding the transformed coefficient and a prediction residual; and a frame buffer that acquires and accumulates the coded transformed coefficient output from the adder; wherein the circuit generates the prediction residual by performing an inter prediction using the coded transformed coefficient of a reference frame read from the frame buffer.
In an analogous art, Han discloses an adder that calculates coded transformed coefficient by adding the transformed coefficient and a prediction residual; and a frame buffer that acquires and accumulates the coded transformed coefficient output from the adder([para 0017]- an entropy decoder which reads information on an optimum quantization step, which is determined such that a maximum quantization error is equal to or less than a minimum threshold transform coefficient with respect to each coefficient of a transformed residual block, and information on a coefficient of the transformed residual block, the coefficient being quantized according to the optimum quantization step, from a received bit-stream; an inverse-quantization unit which inverse-quantizes the coefficients of the transformed residual block, which are quantized according to the read optimum quantization step; an inverse-transform unit which outputs a residual block by inverse-transforming the quantized coefficient of the transformed residual block; a prediction unit which creates a predicted block for a current block to be decoded; and an add unit which restores an image by adding the inverse-transformed residual block and the predicted block); wherein the circuit generates the prediction residual by performing an inter prediction using the coded transformed coefficient of a reference frame read from the frame buffer([para 0010]- creating a residual block by estimating a difference between the current block and the predicted block; creating a transformed residual block and a transformed predicted block by transforming the residual block and the predicted block, respectively; obtaining a minimum threshold transform coefficient which allows a corresponding pixel included in the transformed predicted block to be visually noticeable, and creating a minimum threshold block including the minimum threshold transform coefficient; and determining an optimum quantization step which allows a maximum quantization error to be equal to or less than the minimum threshold transform coefficient with respect to a corresponding coefficient of the transformed residual block). Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to provide the technique of Han to the modified system of Bae and RONDAO image encoding and decoding capable of improving image compression efficiency by using human psycho-visual characteristics [Han; para 0003 ].
Regarding claim 3, Han discloses the circuit performs the inter prediction for each patch([para 0059 ]-performing inter-prediction).
Regarding claim 4, Han discloses the circuit performs the inter prediction in a frequency domain([para 0048]- the first transform unit 430 and the second transform unit 440 perform a frequency transform such as a discrete cosine transform (DCT) or a wavelet transform, thereby creating a transformed residual block R.sub.c1).
Citation of Pertinent Prior Art
The prior art are made of record and not relied upon but considered pertinent to applicant’s disclosure:
1. Hazra et al., US 2023/0393259 A1, discloses generating a target displacement signal indicative of a movement of a human target based on raw digital data generated by a millimeter.
2. Guo et. al., US 2014/0376634 A1, discloses a mode for intra prediction of blocks of video data from predictive blocks of video data within the same picture.
3. Gioia et al., US 2008/0193027 A1, discloses transmission of data representing 3D scenes or 3D objects as well as their decoding for their subsequent reconstruction on a display screen. It can be used for example for the transmission of images or multimedia scenes via the Internet.
4. Cammas et al., US 2007/0291845 A1, discloses a method which consists in analyzing a field of motion of images, estimated by using a first mesh, to detect a faulty area in the first mesh.
5. Wang, King-Wein, US 2016/0275652 A1, method and system for enhancing ridges of fingerprint image.
6. Chen et al., US 2011/0285708 A1, discloses based on a recognition of the fact that in many 3D mesh models certain ranges of dihedral angles are used much more frequently than others. Thus, it is possible during encoding to reduce redundancy.
7. RONDAO et al., US 2025/0259335 A1, decoding, for a frame of three-dimensional object data, a base mesh of the three-dimensional object data, wherein the base mesh has been generated with a geometry component; and decoding, for the frame, a displacement field, where the displacement field comprises wavelet encoded and quantized position displacements
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MD NAZMUL HAQUE whose telephone number is (571)272-5328. The examiner can normally be reached IFW.
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/MD N HAQUE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2487
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