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 .
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
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 (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) 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 1-2 and 5-6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Lee et al. (WO 2018/034414 A1) in view of Seo et al. (US 8,376,549 B2).
Regarding claim 1, Lee et al. teach an image forming apparatus, comprising:
one or more controllers (processor);
an image inputter that optically reads a document (Lee et al. discloses a scan unit that scans a document to generate a scanned image. Abstract); and
a document transporter that transports the document (Lee et al. discloses a scanning apparatus that scans a document and corrects skew of the scanned image. The document is scanned in a document-reading environment consistent with transport/scanning of a document. Abstract; portions describing the scan unit and skew correction), wherein
the one or more controllers
generate a document image obtained by creating an image of the document after the image inputter reads the document while the document transporter transports the document (Lee et al. teaches generating a scanned image from a document and correcting the scanned image. Abstract), and
correct a distortion of the document image by transforming the document image for the mapping function (Lee et al. further teaches correcting skew by rotating the scanned image around a reference point determined from content position. Abstract).
Lee et al. fail to teach specify a mapping function correlating each coordinate of the document with each coordinate of the generated document image. However, Seo et al. teach an image distortion correction system including an alignment controller 200, a first operator 202, a second operator 204, a mapping unit 206, and a driving unit 102. Seo et al. further teaches selecting an image for alignment, operating pixel coordinate values corresponding to the selected image, calculating distortion compensation coordinate values corresponding to the pixel coordinate values, and mapping the distortion compensation values to compensate for image distortion. In particular, Seo et al. expressly discloses distortion compensation functions X’ = f(x+dx, y+dy) and Y’ = g(x+dx, y+dy) for correcting distortion. See abstract; FIGS. 1–5.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the invention was made to combine the teaching of Lee et al. with Seo et al. by applying Seo et al.’s coordinate-based distortion compensation and mapping-function technique to the document-image skew correction system of Lee et al., thereby providing a scanned-document correction system that both detects skew and applies coordinate-based transformation to correct the resulting document image. The combination would have been obvious because Lee et al. already teaches scanned-image skew detection and rotation-based correction, while Seo et al. teaches coordinate-based distortion compensation and mapping functions. Combining these teachings would have predictably improved the correction of scanned document image distortion by supplementing skew correction with coordinate transformation-based compensation (Lee et al., abstract; Seo et al., abstract; FIGS. 1–2).
Regarding claim 2, Lee et al. further teach the image forming apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the mapping function indicates a mapping from the document to the document image generated by reading the document assumed to rotate while moving in a uniform linear motion along a direction of the transport (Lee et al. teaches skew-angle detection and rotation-based correction of the scanned image around a reference point, Abstract).
Regarding claim 5, Lee et al. further teach the image forming apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the one or more controllers calculate a parameter for a correction of the distortion of the document image, based on midpoints of two opposing sides and tilts of the two opposing sides in the document image (Lee et al. teaches skew-angle detection, content-position-based reference point determination, and rotation-based correction of a scanned image, Abstract).
Regarding claim 6, the limitations of the claim are rejected for the same reasons as set forth in the rejection of claim 1 above.
Claim 3 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Lee et al. (WO 2018/034414 A1) in view of Seo et al. (US 8,376,549 B2) as applied to claim 1 above and further in view of Yip et al. (US 2011/0007371 A1).
Regarding claim 3, Lee et al. in view of Seo et al. fail to teach the image forming apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the one or more controllers determine neighboring pixels in the document image corresponding to each pixel in the document and determine a pixel value of each pixel in the document, based on pixel values of the neighboring pixels. However, Yip discloses local image-region analysis, displacement maps, warp maps, affine transforms, interpolation, and refinement of location coordinates based on surrounding image information (FIGS. 12–17, 21, 25, 27, 29; ¶¶ [0148]–[0156], [0193]–[0221], [0223]–[0238]). Yip teaches using local image information and interpolation/refinement from image regions to determine accurate coordinates and image relations (FIGS. 12–17; ¶¶ [0151]–[0156], [0193]–[0221]). Therefore, It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the invention was made to combine Lee et al. in view of Seo et al. and further in view of Yip et al. by applying Seo’s coordinate-mapping distortion compensation and Yip’s local image-region refinement to Lee et al ’s scanned-image skew correction framework. The combination would have been obvious because Lee et al. already teaches document-scanning and skew correction, Seo et al. teaches coordinate-based distortion compensation, and Yip et al. teaches local image-region refinement and coordinate determination using neighboring image information, which would have predictably improved the accuracy of image correction
Claim 4 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Lee et al. (WO 2018/034414 A1) in view of Seo et al. (US 8,376,549 B2) as applied to claim 1 above and further in view of Sadowara (US 2021/0385352 A1).
Regarding claim 4, Lee et al. in view of Seo et al. fails to teach the image forming apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the one or more controllers perform a correction of the distortion of the document image when the document is a size of a business card. However, Sadowara expressly discloses that the original documents may be “a business card, a receipt, and/or a certificate.” ¶ [0033]. Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the invention was made to combine Lee et al. with Seo et al. and further in view of Sadowara by applying the known scanned-image skew correction and coordinate-based distortion compensation techniques to business-card-sized originals as expressly taught by Sadowara. The combination would have been obvious because Sadowara expressly identifies business cards as suitable originals for scanning and paired image handling, and it would have been a predictable and beneficial application of the distortion correction techniques of Lee et al. and Seo et al. in that context (Sadowara, paragraph [0033]; Lee et al., abstract; Seo et al., abstract; FIGS. 1–2).
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
US 2010/0141991 A1 — Image Processing Apparatus, Image Forming Apparatus, and Image Processing Method
This reference describes an image processing apparatus that generates image files from scanned documents and uses a conditional workflow to decide whether to process the image in a “regular mode” or a “simple mode.” It can detect skew, top-to-bottom direction, image regions, and then either apply image correction before formatting or embed draw commands for later correction during display.
US 2016/0044197 A1 — Method of Scanning Document and Image Forming Apparatus for Performing the Same
This reference teaches scanning documents marked with pairs of marks that define regions to extract. The system detects marks on the original image, extracts the areas defined by those marks, and creates a new document file using the extracted images. It also supports OCR and layout reorganization.
WO 2018/078754 A1 — Image Forming Device
This reference appears to describe an image forming device that scans both front and rear surfaces of small originals like business cards and then aligns/matches the images on the front and rear sides so they can be placed properly on recording paper. It includes correction of image position and rotation so front and rear images overlap appropriately.
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/BENNY Q TIEU/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2682
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