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 .
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.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements (IDS) submitted on May 12th 2025 and August 4th 2025 are in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statements are being considered by the examiner.
Claim Interpretation
For claim interpretation purposes, the examiner is interpreting the following claim language:
“Polygon-fan” to be one or more polygons. According to applicant's specification as filed (see specification, paragraph 0091).
"Pivot Vertex " to be a vertex shared between polygons. According to Applicant's specification as filed (see specification, paragraph 0091).
“Neighborhood information” to be any connectivity data regarding vertices, according to broadest reasonable interpretation.
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 4, 7, 14, and 17 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 4 and 14, states the following limitation “…updating a right pivot in the existing neighborhood information according to the pivot vertex of the first polygon-fan.”. Examiner is unsure what vertex is being referred to as “right pivot”. Therefore, for purposes of examination, the examiner is determining that “right pivot” is the “right vertex” referenced in claims 2, 3, 12, and 13 which claims 4 and 14 depend from. Thus, the claim will be examined as best understood by the Examiner.
Claims 7 and 17, states the following limitation “…updating a left pivot in the existing neighborhood information according to the pivot vertex of the first polygon-fan.”. Examiner is unsure what vertex is being referred to as “left pivot”. Therefore, for purposes of examination, the examiner is determining that “left pivot” is the “left vertex” referenced in claims 5, 6, 15, and 16 which claims 7 and 17 depend from. Thus, the claim will be examined as best understood by the Examiner.
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.
Claim(s) 1, 10-11, and 19-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over IDS Filed 08/04/2025 Reference Laroche et al. U.S. Patent Application Publication 20180253867 A1 (hereinafter Laroche).
Regarding claim 1, Laroche teaches a method of mesh processing, comprising:
receiving a bitstream including coded information (Texture Data of a 3D Polygon Mesh Model) of a polygon mesh, the polygon mesh comprising vertices that are connected into polygons, the coded information indicating connectivity information (Connectivity Data) of the vertices; (Para. 0040-0048 and 0071-0075)
determining a first connectivity(Connectivity Data) of a first polygon-fan (Polygon/Triangle of a 3D Mesh) with a first vertex being a (Any Vertex Shared between Polygon/Triangles – Common Vertices Para. 0089, 0188, and 0215) of the first polygon-fan(Polygon/Triangle of a 3D Mesh) according to the coded information; (Para. 0074-0075)
detecting that a second vertex (Traversed Vertex) in the first polygon-fan (Polygon/Triangle) is a visited vertex (An Already Traversed Vertex) that has existing neighborhood information (Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices); Each vertex in the polygon/triangles are identified and indexed by traversing the polygon/triangles, Para. 0075. Analysis is performed on each vertex to discover new polygon/triangles, Para. 0089 and 0105. Thus, while traversing the polygon/triangles Laroche’s invention would know which vertices have been visited and which are new.
checking whether the existing neighborhood information(Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices – Texture Coordinate Indexes Para. 0164) of the second vertex(Traversed Vertex) and new neighboring information (Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices – Texture Coordinate Indexes Para. 0164) of the second vertex(Traversed Vertex) in the first polygon-fan(Polygon/Triangle of a 3D Mesh) satisfy a condition (Duplicate Entries, Para. 0164-0165 and 0191-0193); The texture coordinate table 51 is checked for duplicate vertex texture entries, Para. 0191-0193.
and updating the existing neighborhood information(Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices – Texture Coordinate Indexes Para. 0164) of the second vertex (Traversed Vertex) based on the new neighboring information(Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices – Texture Coordinate Indexes Para. 0164) when the condition is satisfied (Deleting Duplicate Entries, Para. 0164-0165 and 0191-0193). The texture coordinate table 51 is updated when duplicate entries are removed, Para. 0191-0195.
While Laroche’s fails to explicitly teach a pivot vertex. Laroche teaches the polygon/triangles have common vertices and edges (Para. 0089, 0188, and 0215) Which according to applicants’ specification (see specification, paragraph 0091) a pivot vertex is a shared vertex between polygons. Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Laroche’s Vertex’s to incorporate Laroche’s own teaching of a Pivot Vertex.
Since doing so would provide the benefit of determining vertices that share polygon/triangles. Shared vertices in a polygon/triangle enable efficient rendering as vertices are reused to reduce redundant calculation and memory usage.
Regarding claim 10, Laroche teaches the method of claim 1, further comprising: when the second vertex(Traversed Vertex) becomes a (Any Vertex Shared between Polygon/Triangles – Common Vertices Para. 0089, 0188, and 0215), deriving a connectivity(Connectivity Data) of a second polygon-fan(Another Polygon/Triangle of a 3D Mesh) that is incident to the second vertex(Traversed Vertex) based on the existing neighborhood information(Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices) of the second vertex(Traversed Vertex). A 3D Mesh can have various vertices that are incident to different polygons, Para. 0089, 0188, 0215, and 0230. For example in Fig. 6 vertex 1 is a pivot vertex as it is incident to polygons T0-T6. However, that is not the only pivot vertex. For example vertex 2 is a pivot vertex as it is incident to polygons T0 and T6, vertex 3 is a pivot vertex as it is incident to polygons T0 and T1, and so on for vertices 4-8. According to the configuration of Fig. 6 all vertices of each triangle/polygon (T0-T6) can be a pivot vertex as each vertex except for the center vertex 1 shares two polygons. Thus, as the polygons/triangles are traversed each vertex can be a pivot vertex.
Regarding claim 11, Laroche teaches a method of mesh processing, comprising: encoding (Para. 0071 and 0088) the method of claim 1, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 1.
Regarding claim 19, has similar limitations as of claim 10, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 10.
Regarding claim 20, Laroche teaches a method of processing mesh data, the method comprising: processing a bitstream (Para. 0071) of coded information(Texture Data of a 3D Polygon Mesh Model) of a polygon mesh(Polygon/Triangle of a 3D Mesh) according to a format rule (Encoding using SC3DMC-TFAN, Para. 0089)bits, wherein: the polygon mesh(Polygon/Triangle of a 3D Mesh) includes vertices that are connected into polygons, the coded information(Texture Data of a 3D Polygon Mesh Model) indicates connectivity information(Connectivity Data) of the vertices the polygon mesh; (Para. 0040-0048 and 0071-0075) and the format rule is the method of claims 1 and 11, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claims and 11.
Claim(s) 2-9 and 12-18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over IDS Filed 08/04/2025 Reference Laroche et al. U.S. Patent Application Publication 20180253867 A1 (hereinafter Laroche) in view of IDS Filed 08/04/2025 Reference Mammou et al. U.S. Patent Application Publication 20220392115 A1 (hereinafter Mammou).
Regarding claim 2, Laroche teaches the method of claim 1, wherein the checking further comprises:
Checking (Considering each vertex of the 3D Mesh Model, Para. 0217) whether a (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0224) is set in the existing neighborhood information(Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices – Texture Coordinate Indexes Para. 0164) of the second vertex(Traversed Vertex); (Fig. 6)
and when the (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0224) is set in the existing neighborhood information(Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices – Texture Coordinate Indexes Para. 0164) of the second vertex(Traversed Vertex), checking whether the (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0224) in the existing neighborhood information is equal (Duplicate Entries, Para. 0164-0165 and 0191-0193) to a (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0224) of the second vertex in the first polygon-fan(Polygon/Triangle of a 3D Mesh). (Fig.5 and Fig. 6) In Fig. 6 vertex 1 is a pivot vertex as it is shared between all triangles T0-T6. The connectivity data is used to identify all vertices these triangles share to delete duplicate entries in the Texture Coordinate Table, Fig. 5. When the texture coordinates match the duplicate is removed and the index is modified, Para. 0224.
However, Laroche fails to explicitly teach left and right vertices.
Laroche and Mammou are analogous to the claimed invention because both of them are in the same field of traversing interconnected vertices that form triangle polygon meshes.
Mammou teaches left and right vertices. (Para and 0011, 0048-0051) Mammou teaches determining common vertices (Pivot Points, Para. 0045) and the left/right vertices of a triangle (Para. 0048-0051). Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Laroche’s Vertices to incorporate Mammou Determination of Left/Right Vertices. Since doing so would provide the benefit of determining the position of each vertices of a triangle relative to one another (Mammou et al. Para. 0048).
Regarding claim 3, Laroche the method of claim 2, wherein the updating comprises:
when the (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0225) in the existing neighborhood information (Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices – Texture Coordinate Indexes Para. 0164) is not equal (Not a Duplicate Entry, Para. 0164-0165 and 0191-0193) to the (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0225) of the second vertex(Traversed Vertex) in the first polygon-fan(Polygon/Triangle of a 3D Mesh), updating (Keeping the Texture Coordinate in the Table modifying the index Para. 0225) a (Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices – Texture Coordinate Indexes Para. 0164) according to the When a set of texture coordinate do not match the table is updated with the appropriate index, Para. 0225.
However, Laroche fails to explicitly teach left and right vertices.
Mammou teaches left and right vertices. (Para and 0011, 0048-0051) Mammou teaches determining common vertices (Pivot Points, Para. 0045) and the left/right vertices of a triangle (Para. 0048-0051). Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Laroche’s Vertices to incorporate Mammou Determination of Left/Right Vertices. Since doing so would provide the benefit of determining the position of each vertices of a triangle relative to one another (Mammou et al. Para. 0048).
Regarding claim 4, Laroche teaches the method of claim 3, further comprising: updating (Modifying Texture Coordinate Table) a (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0225) in the existing neighborhood information(Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices – Texture Coordinate Indexes Para. 0164) according to the (Any Vertex Shared between Polygon/Triangles – Common Vertices Para. 0089, 0188, and 0215) of the first polygon-fan(Polygon/Triangle of a 3D Mesh).
However, Laroche fails to explicitly teach left and right vertices.
Mammou teaches left and right vertices. (Para and 0011, 0048-0051) Mammou teaches determining common vertices (Pivot Points, Para. 0045) and the left/right vertices of a triangle (Para. 0048-0051). Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Laroche’s Vertices to incorporate Mammou Determination of Left/Right Vertices. Since doing so would provide the benefit of determining the position of each vertices of a triangle relative to one another (Mammou et al. Para. 0048).
Regarding claim 5, Laroche teaches the method of claim 1, wherein the checking further comprises:
checking(Considering each vertex of the 3D Mesh Model, Para. 0217) whether a (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0224) is set in the existing neighborhood information(Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices – Texture Coordinate Indexes Para. 0164) of the second vertex(Traversed Vertex); (Fig. 6)
and when the (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0224) is set in the existing neighborhood information(Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices – Texture Coordinate Indexes Para. 0164) of the second vertex(Traversed Vertex), checking whether the (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0224) in the existing neighborhood information is equal(Duplicate Entries, Para. 0164-0165 and 0191-0193) to a (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0224) of the second vertex in the first polygon-fan(Polygon/Triangle of a 3D Mesh). (Fig.5 and Fig. 6) In Fig. 6 vertex 1 is a pivot vertex as it is shared between all triangles T0-T6. The connectivity data is used to identify all vertices these triangles share to delete duplicate entries in the Texture Coordinate Table, Fig. 5. When the texture coordinates match the duplicate is removed and the index is modified, Para. 0224.
However, Laroche fails to explicitly teach right and left vertices.
Laroche and Mammou are analogous to the claimed invention because both of them are in the same field of traversing interconnected vertices that form triangle polygon meshes.
Mammou teaches right and left vertices. (Para and 0011, 0048-0051) Mammou teaches determining common vertices (Pivot Points, Para. 0045) and the right/left vertices of a triangle (Para. 0048-0051). Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Laroche’s Vertices to incorporate Mammou Determination of Right/Left Vertices. Since doing so would provide the benefit of determining the position of each vertices of a triangle relative to one another (Mammou et al. Para. 0048).
Regarding claim 6, Laroche teaches the method of claim 5, wherein the updating comprises:
when the (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0225) in the existing neighborhood information(Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices – Texture Coordinate Indexes Para. 0164) is not equal (Not a Duplicate Entry, Para. 0164-0165 and 0191-0193)to the (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0225) of the second vertex(Traversed Vertex) in the first polygon-fan(Polygon/Triangle of a 3D Mesh), updating a (Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices – Texture Coordinate Indexes Para. 0164) according to the
However, Laroche fails to explicitly teach right and left vertices.
Mammou teaches right and left vertices. (Para and 0011, 0048-0051) Mammou teaches determining common vertices (Pivot Points, Para. 0045) and the right/left vertices of a triangle (Para. 0048-0051). Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Laroche’s Vertices to incorporate Mammou Determination of Right/Left Vertices. Since doing so would provide the benefit of determining the position of each vertices of a triangle relative to one another (Mammou et al. Para. 0048).
Regarding claim 7, Laroche teaches the method of claim 6, further comprising: updating(Modifying Texture Coordinate Table) a (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0225) in the existing neighborhood information(Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices – Texture Coordinate Indexes Para. 0164) according to the (Any Vertex Shared between Polygon/Triangles – Common Vertices Para. 0089, 0188, and 0215) of the first polygon-fan(Polygon/Triangle of a 3D Mesh).
However, Laroche fails to explicitly teach right and left vertices.
Mammou teaches right and left vertices. (Para and 0011, 0048-0051) Mammou teaches determining common vertices (Pivot Points, Para. 0045) and the right/left vertices of a triangle (Para. 0048-0051). Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Laroche’s Vertices to incorporate Mammou Determination of Right/Left Vertices. Since doing so would provide the benefit of determining the position of each vertices of a triangle relative to one another (Mammou et al. Para. 0048).
Regarding claim 8, Laroche teaches the method of claim 1, further comprising: resetting (Modifying and Deleting Duplicates Para. 0208 and 224-0225) a (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0225) and/or a (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0225) in the existing neighborhood information(Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices – Texture Coordinate Indexes Para. 0164) of the second vertex(Traversed Vertex) to an (Setting Table Entry to Null or Specific Value, Para. 0208) when the existing neighborhood information and the new neighboring information(Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices – Texture Coordinate Indexes Para. 0164) satisfy one or more conditions (Duplicate Entries, Para. 0164-0165 and 0191-0193). The Texture Coordinate Table is modified based on if the entries are duplicates or not (Para. 0224-0225).
However, Laroche fails to explicitly teach resetting a left vertex and/or a right vertex in the existing neighborhood information of the second vertex to an unvisited state.
Mammou teaches the method of claim 1, further comprising: resetting a left vertex and/or a right vertex(Para and 0011, 0048-0051) in the existing neighborhood information (Traversal Order of Polygon Mesh, Para. 0110-0111) of the second vertex (Any Previously Encoded Vertex, Para. 0031, 0072-0073, and 0083) to an unvisited state (Placeholder Information, Para. 0117) when the existing neighborhood information(Traversal Order of Polygon Mesh, Para. 0110-0111) and the new neighboring information (Re-ordering Traversal Order Para. 0078-0079 or New Vertices Information Associated to Pivot Point Para. 0077 and Newly Encoded Vertices Para. 0119) satisfy one or more conditions (Priority Ranking Each Vertex Para. 0113, Identified Similar Information Para. 0114, or Non-Existing Vertices Para. 0117 or 0119) . Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Laroche’s Encoding of Vertices to incorporate Mammou’s Placeholder Vertices. Since doing so would provide the benefit of handling vertices that do not exist when traversing the polygon mesh or when modifying the traversal order (Mammou et al. Para. 01117).
Regarding claim 9, Laroche teaches the method of claim 8, further comprising:
Resetting (Modifying and Deleting Duplicates Para. 0208 and 224-0225) the (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0225) in the existing neighborhood information(Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices – Texture Coordinate Indexes Para. 0164) of the second vertex(Traversed Vertex) when the (Duplicate Entries, Para. 0164-0165 and 0191-0193) a (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0225) of the second vertex(Traversed Vertex) in the first polygon-fan(Polygon/Triangle of a 3D Mesh); The Texture Coordinate Table is modified based on if the entries are duplicates or not (Para. 0224-0225).
and/or resetting(Modifying and Deleting Duplicates Para. 0208 and 224-0225) the (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0225) in the existing neighborhood information(Any Connectivity Data Associated with Vertices – Texture Coordinate Indexes Para. 0164) of the second vertex(Traversed Vertex) when the (Duplicate Entries, Para. 0164-0165 and 0191-0193) a (Vertices Associated that Share Polygons, Para. 0215-0225) of the second vertex(Traversed Vertex) in the first polygon-fan(Polygon/Triangle of a 3D Mesh). The Texture Coordinate Table is modified based on if the entries are duplicates or not (Para. 0224-0225).
However, Laroche fails to explicitly teach right and left vertices.
Mammou teaches right and left vertices. (Para and 0011, 0048-0051) Mammou teaches determining common vertices (Pivot Points, Para. 0045) and the right/left vertices of a triangle (Para. 0048-0051). Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Laroche’s Vertices to incorporate Mammou Determination of Right/Left Vertices. Since doing so would provide the benefit of determining the position of each vertices of a triangle relative to one another (Mammou et al. Para. 0048).
Regarding claim 12, has similar limitations as of claim 2, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 2.
Regarding claim 13, has similar limitations as of claim 3, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 3.
Regarding claim 14, has similar limitations as of claim 4, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 4.
Regarding claim 15, has similar limitations as of claim 5, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 5.
Regarding claim 16, has similar limitations as of claim 6, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 6.
Regarding claim 17, has similar limitations as of claim 7, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 7.
Regarding claim 18, has similar limitations as of claim 8, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 8.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to BRIANNA R COCHRAN whose telephone number is (571)272-4671. The examiner can normally be reached Mon-Fri. 7:30am - 5:00pm.
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/BRIANNA RENAE COCHRAN/Examiner, Art Unit 2615
/ALICIA M HARRINGTON/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2615
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