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 .
DETAILED ACTION
This Office Action is in response to the application 19/073,515 filed on 04/25/2025.
Claims 1 – 20 have been examined and are pending in this application.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 12/29/2025 and 03/27/2025. The submission is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Specification
The lengthy specification has not been checked to the extent necessary to determine the presence of all possible minor errors. Applicant’s cooperation is requested in correcting any errors of which applicant may become aware in the specification.
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 1 – 20 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.
In claims 2 - 4, 9 – 11, 16 – 18, the wording "lossless bits" and "lossy bits" is used, but said wording has not an agreed unambiguous technical meaning in video coding and it is thus unclear, lossless and lossy coding are two different coding technique. Moreover, said "bits", according to claims 4,9 (see below) are apparently coexistent in a single coding unit and it is unclear and undefined how that may occur.
In claims 2, 3, 9, 10, 16 and 17, the parameter "information amount" is unclear, as it is defined as indicating "complexity of content that is expressed by the coding unit and that is in content expressed by the current frame". It is thus unclear whether this parameter refers to a "coding unit" or to a "frame". Moreover, the indication of "complexity of content" provided by said parameter appears to be a result to be achieved, devoid of essential features for that purpose.
Claim 4 and 11, a technical link between the different number of bits included in the claim and the quantization parameter is not sufficiently defined. Additional clarification will be required.
Rest of the other dependent claims, either directly or indirectly, dependent from a independent claims rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b).
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.
Claim 1, 2, 5 – 9, 12 – 16, 19 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhao et al. (US 7,406,124 B1) in view of Azadegan et al. (US 5,623,424).
Regarding claim 1, Zhao discloses: “a method, comprising:
obtaining a to-be-decoded bitstream of a coding unit in an image bitstream [see col: 10; lines: 20 – 30; As illustrated by brackets in FIG. 6, portions of the process are related to bit allocation, to rate control, and to adaptive quantization. Bit allocation relates to estimating the number of bits that should be used to encode the picture to be encoded. Rate control relates to determining the reference quantization parameter Qj that should be used to encode a macroblock. Adaptive quantization relates to analyzing the spatial activity in the macroblocks in order to modify the reference quantization parameter~ and calculate the value of the quantization parameter mquant:J that is used to quantize a macro block];
determining, based on image content of the coding unit and a first number of bits of data in a bitstream buffer, a target number of bits of the coding unit [see col: 13; lines: 61 – 66; In one embodiment, the updated values are expressed by Equations 13c, 14c, and 15c. The use of Equations 13c, 14c, and 15c permit the allocation of bits to macroblocks within a picture to be advantageously allocated based on the motion activity of a macroblock within a picture. See col: 13; lines: 34 – 41; The variable B1 corresponds to the number of bits that have already been used to encode the macroblocks in the picture that is being encoded, including the bits used in macro block j such that the variable B1_1 corresponds to the number of bits that have been used to encode the macro blocks up to but not including the j-th macro block. The variables TMB1_ /, TMB1_1P, and TMB1_/, correspond to the bits allocated to encode the macro blocks up to but not including the j-th macro block],
wherein the image content indicates complexity of pixel regions in the coding unit [see col: 10; lines: 62 – 67; In the state 608, the process initializes values for complexity estimators Xi, Xp, and Xb and for the remaining number of bits R allocated to the group of pictures that is to be encoded. In one embodiment, the process initializes the values for the complexity estimators Xi, Xp, and Xb according to Equations 1-3], and
decoding, based on the quantization parameter, the to-be-decoded bitstream [see col: 10; lines: 20 – 30; As illustrated by brackets in FIG. 6, portions of the process are related to bit allocation, to rate control, and to adaptive quantization. Bit allocation relates to estimating the number of bits that should be used to encode the picture to be encoded. Rate control relates to determining the reference quantization parameter Qj that should be used to encode a macroblock. Adaptive quantization relates to analyzing the spatial activity in the macroblocks in order to modify the reference quantization parameter~ and calculate the value of the quantization parameter mquant:J that is used to quantize a macro block].
Zhao does not explicitly disclose: “wherein the target number of bits indicates a first expected number of bits from performing lossy coding on the coding unit based on the image content;
determining, based on the target number of bits, a quantization parameter”.
However, Azadegan, from the same or similar field of endeavor teaches: “wherein the target number of bits indicates a first expected number of bits [see col: 34; lines: 3 – 20; In order to determine the quantizer scale which will produce the target bits assigned to a particular coded frame of video, the above equation is used with `R` representing the target bits, and the values of (X, g, H) are read from the stored data file which may be the log file described above. The value of `Q` that best fits this equation is the desired quantizer scale. Then, step 292 re-encodes the changed sections of video using the quantizer values determined in step 290. It is to be noted that re-encoding segments of previously encoded video may create encoding artifact problems unless special procedures are followed during the re-encoding. Details of the re-encoding process to avoid encoding and decoding artifacts are described in a separate section below. After the video is re-encoded, it is substituted into the bitstream for the previously encoded video, and the process ends] from performing lossy coding on the coding unit based on the image content [see col: 24; lines: 38 – 65; Next, step 284 inputs the user quality settings for selected time periods. The user inputs priorities for different sections which are ultimately used to control the quantization of the pictures. The quantization controls the picture quality, also referred to as resolution, for lossy MPEG encodings. FIG. 13 illustrates a user interface which is used in order to gather the information to change the quality of the video over periods of time];
determining, based on the target number of bits, a quantization parameter [see col: 33; lines: 48 – 62; To determine the quantization level on a picture-by-picture basis, a rate-quantizer function (RQF) was determined in step 282. To estimate this function, two data points for each picture are required. The RQF is: R=X*Q.sup.(-g) +H (22), where R is the number of bits used to code one picture, Q is the quantizer scale, X, g, and H are the picture by picture basis coding characteristic parameters. H represents the bits which are independent of the quantizer scale so H is the bits consumed by the header, the motion vectors, the DC coefficients, etc. X and g are estimated from a pair of data points corresponding to the AC coefficient bits used to code the picture for a given quantizer scale].
It would have been obvious to the person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system/head mounted camera system disclosed by Zhao to add the teachings of Azadegan as above, in order to provide a means for improving coding efficiency, on the basis of image content and target number of bits, quantization parameter will be determined and decode the bitstream. As discussed in the above paragraphs, it shows quantization parameters are determined based on image content and bit rate estimation [Azadegan see para: col: 34; lines: 3 – 20; col: 24; lines: 38 – 65; col: 33; lines: 48 – 62]
Regarding claim 2, the Examiner takes Official Notice that, in claim 1, basically determine the first or initial number of bits, similarly, claim 2 determine the second number of bits and can be determine 3rd and 4th number of bits for lossless coding based on the image content and so on, which is commonly known in the art, executed by the image encoder or decoder circuits and based on that number, system can perform lossless coding and therefore it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the instant application to incorporate what is known in the art the teaching of the Zhao and Azadegan reference due to the fact that the combining would improve the efficiency of encoding and decoding process for that specific image content.
Regarding claim 5, Zhao and Azadegan disclose all the limitation of claim 1 and are analyzed as previously discussed with respect to that claim.
Furthermore, Zhao discloses: “wherein the image content comprises a complexity level of the coding unit [see col: 10; lines: 62 – 67; In the state 608, the process initializes values for complexity estimators Xi, Xp, and Xb and for the remaining number of bits R allocated to the group of pictures that is to be encoded. In one embodiment, the process initializes the values for the complexity estimators Xi, Xp, and Xb according to Equations 1-3].
Regarding claim 6, Zhao and Azadegan disclose all the limitation of claim 5 and are analyzed as previously discussed with respect to that claim.
Furthermore, Zhao discloses: “wherein the complexity level comprises a luminance complexity level or a chrominance complexity level [see col:4 lines: 1 – 6; The macroblocks include sections for storing luminance (brightness) components and sections for storing chrominance (color) components. It will be understood by one of ordinary skill in the art that the video data stream can also include corresponding audio information, which is also encoded and decoded].
Regarding claim 7, Zhao and Azadegan disclose all the limitation of claim 1 and are analyzed as previously discussed with respect to that claim.
Furthermore, Zhao discloses: “further comprising decoding, based on the quantization parameter, the to-be-decoded bitstream to obtain a reconstructed image of the coding unit [see col: 19 lines: 26 – 45; In one embodiment, the process further inspects the computed quantization parameter mquantj and limits its value to prevent undesirable clipping of a resulting quantized level QAC(ij). For example, where one embodiment of the process is used to encode video according to the MPEG-1 standard, the process detects that the calculated value for the quantization parameter mquantj corresponds to 2, and automatically substitutes a value of 4. The quantization parameter mquantj is later used in the macroblock encoding process to generate values for the quantized level QAC(ij). However, in MPEG-1, a value for the quantized level QAC(ij) is clipped to the range between −255 and 255 to fit within 8 bits. This clipping of data can result in visible artifacts, which can advantageously be avoided by limiting the value of a quantization parameter mquantj to a value that prevents the clipping of the resulting quantized level, thereby advantageously improving picture quality].
Regarding claim 8 and 15, claim 8 is rejected under the same art and evidentiary limitations as determined for the method of claim 1.
Regarding claim 9 and 16, claim 9 and 16 is rejected under the same art and evidentiary limitations as determined for the method of claim 2.
Regarding claim 12, claim 12 is rejected under the same art and evidentiary limitations as determined for the method of claim 5.
Regarding claim 13 and 19, claim 13 and 19 is rejected under the same art and evidentiary limitations as determined for the method of claim 6.
Regarding claim 14 and 20, claim 14 and 20 is rejected under the same art and evidentiary limitations as determined for the method of claim 7.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 3, 4, 10, 11, 17 and 18 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Feng et al (US 2022/0329818 A1).
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Masum Billah whose telephone number is (571)270-0701. The examiner can normally be reached Mon - Friday 9 - 5 PM ET.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Jamie J. Atala can be reached at (571) 272-7384. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/MASUM BILLAH/Primary Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2486
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