DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
In the present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, claims 1-6 have been considered and examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Respond to Applicant’s Arguments/Remarks
Applicant’s arguments, see Remarks, filed 07/07/2026, with respect to the rejection(s) of claims 1-5, based solely on the limitations as amended, has been fully considered but are moot because the arguments do not apply to the new combination of references including prior art being used in the current rejection (see below for detail) under new grounds of rejection, necessitated by amendment.
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 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.
Claims 1-6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Park (Park – US 2024/0176154 A1) in view of Watanabe (Watanabe – US 2021/0107356 A1) and Lee et al. (Lee – US 2023/0358381 A1).
As to claim 1, Park discloses a vehicular road surface drawing device, comprising:
a projection device (Park: FIG. 1 the projection headlamp 20) that is provided in a vehicle including a driver's seat (Park: [0009]-[0012], and FIG. 1) that is configured to be height-adjustable with respect to a floor face (Park: [0012], [0025], [0064]-[0067], [0109]-[0113], and FIG. 5: The position of the projection image A of the projection headlamp 20 is calculated when the seat position is changed. In other words, when it is determined that a seat height is changed or a seat has adjusted in forward and backward directions, it is determined that the driver's eye position is changed according to the seat position and the position of the projection image A is calculated ),
the projection device to project an optical image on a road surface on which the vehicle is traveling, the optical image being projected in front of the vehicle in a traveling direction of the vehicle (Park: [0051]-[0053], [0058]-[0065], [0073], [0098]-[0099], FIG. 1, and FIG. 5: the controller 30 may adjust the position of the projection image A generated on the road surface to become closer to or farther away from the mobility device. When the driver's eye position is changed in left and right directions, the controller 30 may adjust the position of the projection image A generated on the road surface in the left and right directions with respect to the mobility device); and
a control unit (Park: FIG. 1 the controller 30) configured to control the projection device (Park: [0051]-[0053], [0058]-[0065], [0073], [0098]-[0099], FIG. 1, and FIG. 5: the controller 30 may adjust the position of the projection image A generated on the road surface to become closer to or farther away from the mobility device. When the driver's eye position is changed in left and right directions, the controller 30 may adjust the position of the projection image A generated on the road surface in the left and right directions with respect to the mobility device).
While Park discloses the control unit is configured to project the projection image closer or further away from the vehicle based on the driver eye’s position changing in up or down directions indicative of the driver seat changes (Park: [0012], [0025], [0058], [0062]-[0066], and FIG. 1: The controller may further receive information about a seat position, and when it is determined that the seat position is changed, the controller may calculate the position of the projection image of the projection headlamp according to the amount of change in the driver's eye position), Park does not explicitly disclose the projection device including a shade that includes a plurality of image forming holes through which a light is projected, and being configured to project the light through the image forming holes of the shade to project an optical image on a road surface and a control unit configured to control the projection device such that, when the height of the driver's seat with respect to the floor face is at least a first threshold value, a distance in the traveling direction between an end portion of the optical image on a traveling direction side and the vehicle becomes shorter than when the height is below the first threshold value.
However, it has been known in the art of vehicle information display to implement a control unit configured to control the projection device such that, when the height of the driver's seat with respect to the floor face is at least a first threshold value, a distance in the traveling direction between an end portion of the optical image on a traveling direction side and the vehicle becomes shorter than when the height is below the first threshold value, as suggested by Watanabe, which discloses a control unit configured to control the projection device such that, when the height of the driver's seat with respect to the floor face is at least a first threshold value, a distance in the traveling direction between an end portion of the optical image on a traveling direction side and the vehicle becomes shorter than when the height is below the first threshold value (Watanabe: Abstract, [0052]-[0056], [0077], [0088], [0094], [0098]-[0105], FIG. 4-9, and FIG. 10-13: For the comparison, the drawing also shows the position PTA in the first state and others. The second state indicates, for example, a state with a second posture caused when the same person as the first driver of FIG. 4 changes the driver's seat or his/her posture. Alternatively, the second state indicates, for example, a state with the second posture in a case of a second driver who is different from the first driver of FIG. 4, such as a person having a larger human body size. Particularly, the eye position in the second posture is a position “P1B” that is higher in the Y direction and more backward in the Z direction than those of the position PIA in the first state. The position P1B has positional coordinates (X1B, Y1B, Z1B) and a height “H1B” from the ground. The drawing also shows an eye box “EB” centering the position P1B. The position P1B is a position out of the eye box EA of the position PIA in the first state).
Therefore, in view of teachings by Park and Watanabe, it would have been obvious to one of the ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement in the vehicle display of Park to include a control unit configured to control the projection device such that, when the height of the driver's seat with respect to the floor face is at least a first threshold value, a distance in the traveling direction between an end portion of the optical image on a traveling direction side and the vehicle becomes shorter than when the height is below the first threshold value, as suggested by Watanabe. The motivation for this is to adjust a position of a protection image based on driver seat position.
While the combination of by Park and Watanabe discloses the control unit is configured to project the projection image closer or further away from the vehicle based on the driver eye’s position changing in up or down directions indicative of the driver seat changes (Park: [0012], [0025], [0058], [0062]-[0066], and FIG. 1: The controller may further receive information about a seat position, and when it is determined that the seat position is changed, the controller may calculate the position of the projection image of the projection headlamp according to the amount of change in the driver's eye position), the combination of by Park and Watanabe does not explicitly disclose the projection device including a shade that includes a plurality of image forming holes through which a light is projected, and being configured to project the light through the image forming holes of the shade to project an optical image on a road surface.
However, it has been known in the art of vehicle display to implement the projection device including a shade that includes a plurality of image forming holes through which a light is projected, and being configured to project the light through the image forming holes of the shade to project an optical image on a road surface, as suggested by Lee, which discloses the projection device including a shade that includes a plurality of image forming holes through which a light is projected, and being configured to project the light through the image forming holes of the shade to project an optical image on a road surface (Lee: Abstract, [0083], [0086], [0092]-[0098], FIG. 5-7 and FIG. 15-19: each of the unit masks 161 may include a shield area 162 that is configured to shield the light, and a through area 163 having a shape corresponding to the masking pattern. According to the shape of the through area 163, that is, the shape of the masking pattern, an image of the beam pattern that is projected to the road surface 2 may be changed. The unit mask 161 may have a plate shape as an example, and the specific beam pattern may be formed by masking the light in the shield area 162).
Therefore, in view of teachings by Park, Watanabe, and Lee, it would have been obvious to one of the ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement in the vehicle display of Park and Watanabe to include the projection device including a shade that includes a plurality of image forming holes through which a light is projected, and being configured to project the light through the image forming holes of the shade to project an optical image on a road surface, as suggested by Lee. The motivation for this is to implement a known alternative projection device for providing information to drivers.
As to claim 2, Park, Watanabe, and Lee disclose the limitations of claim 1 further comprising the vehicular road surface drawing device according to claim 1, wherein the control unit controls the projection device such that a dimension of the optical image in the traveling direction when the height of the driver's seat is at least the first threshold value is shorter than a dimension when the height is below the first threshold value (Watanabe: Abstract, [0052]-[0056], [0077], [0088], [0094], [0098]-[0105], [0155], [0196], FIG. 4-9, FIG. 10-13, and FIG. 19: The AR display 15 supplies the converted data as shown in FIG. 18B as the AR data to the display 20. In the manner, the AR content (such as the AR image G1) as shown in FIG. 11 is displayed in the visual recognition area 5 by the projection display from the display 20. In this case, the display shift between the real image and the virtual image (the AR image of the AR display area 7) as shown in FIG. 12 is reduced).
As to claim 3, Park, Watanabe, and Lee disclose the limitations of claim 2 further comprising the vehicular road surface drawing device according to claim 2, wherein a shape of the optical image, when the height of the driver's seat is no smaller than the first threshold value, is a shape in which an entire optical image, when the height is smaller than the first threshold value, is reduced in the traveling direction (Watanabe: Abstract, [0052]-[0056], [0077], [0088], [0094], [0098]-[0105], [0155], [0196], FIG. 4-9, FIG. 10-13, and FIG. 19: As described above, since the HUD apparatus 1 of the first embodiment has the function of automatically correcting the positions of the AR display area 7 and the AR image, the display shift between the real image and the virtual image is excluded or reduced, so that the favorable AR display is achieved).
As to claim 4, Park, Watanabe, and Lee disclose the limitations of claim 3 further comprising the vehicular road surface drawing device according to claim 3, further comprising an angle adjustment device that adjusts an angle of the projection device with respect to a horizontal direction, in a side view of the vehicle (Park: [0059], [0070], and FIG. 1: When the driver's eye position is changed in left and right directions, the controller 30 may adjust the position of the projection image A generated on the road surface in the left and right directions with respect to the mobility device and Watanabe: Abstract, [0052]-[0056], [0077], [0088], [0094], [0098]-[0105], [0155], [0196], FIG. 4-9, FIG. 10-13, and FIG. 19: As described above, since the HUD apparatus 1 of the first embodiment has the function of automatically correcting the positions of the AR display area 7 and the AR image, the display shift between the real image and the virtual image is excluded or reduced, so that the favorable AR display is achieved ).
As to claim 5, Park, Watanabe, and Lee disclose the limitations of claim 2 further comprising the vehicular road surface drawing device according to claim 2, wherein a shape of the optical image when the height of the driver's seat is no smaller than the first threshold value is a shape in which part of the optical image, when the height is smaller than the first threshold value, is omitted (Watanabe: Abstract, [0052]-[0056], [0077], [0088], [0094], [0098]-[0105], [0155], [0196], FIG. 4-9, FIG. 10-13, and FIG. 19: As described above, since the HUD apparatus 1 of the first embodiment has the function of automatically correcting the positions of the AR display area 7 and the AR image, the display shift between the real image and the virtual image is excluded or reduced, so that the favorable AR display is achieved).
As to claim 6, Park, Watanabe, and Lee disclose the limitations of claim 1 further comprising the vehicular road surface drawing device according to claim 1, wherein the plurality of image forming holes are formed as through holes in the shade (Lee: Abstract, [0083], [0086], [0092]-[0098], FIG. 5-7 and FIG. 15-19: each of the unit masks 161 may include a shield area 162 that is configured to shield the light, and a through area 163 having a shape corresponding to the masking pattern. According to the shape of the through area 163, that is, the shape of the masking pattern, an image of the beam pattern that is projected to the road surface 2 may be changed. The unit mask 161 may have a plate shape as an example, and the specific beam pattern may be formed by masking the light in the shield area 162).
Citation of Pertinent Art
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant’s disclosure:
Mochizuki, US 2024/0359619 A1, discloses vehicle lamp.
Vetsch et al., US 12,025,799 B2, discloses head-up display system.
Miao, US 2020/0379322 A1, discloses pico projector and control method therefor.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP §706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any extension fee pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to QUANG PHAM whose telephone number is (571)-270-3668. The examiner can normally be reached 09:00 AM - 05:00 PM.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, QUAN-ZHEN WANG can be reached at (571)-272-3114. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/QUANG PHAM/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2685
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