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
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 9, 10, 11, 16 and 3, 6 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 9 and 3 teach “the gray level compensation formula is: AG=(K2-K1)xGl, wherein AG is the actual gray-level value offset of a pixel, K2 is a standard gray coefficient determined based on the preset brightness-gray relationship, and K2 is a positive integer, and wherein the preset brightness-gray relationship is: L2=K2XG2, wherein, L2 is a standard brightness value of one pixel, and G2 is a standard gray-level value of one pixel.” The output AG is taught to be the “actual gray-level value offset” that when added to the original gray level value will change it so that its output brightness becomes the intended correct brightness. This offset, which is in the same units/format as the gray level values as it is added to the gray level values is calculated by AG=(K2-K1)xGl. Coefficient K2 originates from L2=K2XG2, brightness L2 cannot truly be solved for by an equation and is obtained by capturing an image of the display, as clarified by the specifications ¶4 cited below. The equation instead provides a model for relationships, where K2 can be understood as K2=L2/G2, aka a measure of brightness over grayscale. Subtracting two brightness / grayscale values (K2-K1) and multiplying by G1, another gray scale value, in no way converts K2-K1 to grayscale values. Thus, the output offset value is not actually a grayscale value and cannot be directly added to the original grayscale value to compensate for DeMura. Without any explanation as to how a conversion to grayscale units is done or where, the equation of claim 9 and 3 cannot be properly defined, understood, or used.
Regarding claims 6, 10, 11, 16: Claims 6, 10, 11, 16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) based on their dependency on rejected claims 3 and 9
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1, 4, 7, 12, 14, 17, are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Wang (US 11211021 B2).
Regarding claim 7, 1,
Wang teaches:
A Demura compensating system for a micro display panel for a micro display panel,(Wang Col. 1 Line 25 “The production process of the liquid crystal panel is very complicated and hard to control and manage, so the Mura effect occurs easily on the LCD panel; furthermore, the brightness difference on some areas or blocks of the LCD panel cause nonuniform display, and it decreases the quality level of the LCD panel. ” Note: Wang teaches a Demura compensation system for a liquid crystal display, a type of display that commonly suffers from Mura similar to a micro display panel. While Wang does not specify directly that its liquid crystal display is a micro display, both often have Mura and the compensation via Demura and handling of the displays is identical between the two. Thus, Wang teaches this portion as a micro display is not different in any significant manner from Wang’s liquid crystal display, or any display that can encounter Mura.) comprising: an image acquisition module, configured to perform an image acquisition on the micro display panel to obtain an initial display image displayed by pixels of the micro display panel; (Wang Col. 2 Line 6 “According to an embodiment, the present disclosure provides a grayscale adjustment device of a display panel, and the grayscale adjustment device includes an image capture module, an identification module, a calculation module and an adjustment module. The image capture module is configured to capture an image of the display panel, to obtain a current image.” Col. 1 Line 32 “In order to reduce the non-uniform area, a Demura technology is developed to use CCD camera to obtain the brightness signal of the panel, thereby detecting the non-uniform area of the image, the central area of panel is set as the reference, the brightness value of other area is compared with the brightness value of the central area to obtain the difference value, and a compensation value is calculated according to the difference value and Gamma 2.2 curve, thereby making the brightness of entire panel uniform.”) a calculation module, configured to determine an actual brightness-gray relationship of each pixel from the initial display image; (Wang Abstract “The grayscale adjustment method includes steps of capturing an image of the display panel to obtain a current image; identifying a non-uniform block in the current image, and detecting an original output brightness value and an original input grayscale of the non-uniform block; determining a target input grayscale corresponding to a preset target brightness value according to an actual gamma curve value, wherein the actual gamma curve value is obtained by testing the display panel; and setting a difference between the original input grayscale and the target input grayscale as a grayscale compensation value of the non-uniform block.” Col. 5 Line 4 “The gamma mathematic model expresses the corresponding relationship between the reference input grayscale and the reference output brightness value.” Note: An “actual brightness-gray relationship” refers to what output brightness is actually output by the display for a given pixel given its input gray scale value. Wang Abstract teaches this as an original input grayscale has its corresponding “actual brightness”, referred to by Wang as original output brightness, found by capturing an image of the display. As Wang is able to obtain the actual brightness pixels will output and associate that value with the input grayscale value that produced it, Wang teaches determining an actual brightness-gray relationship from the image of the display. This teaches that this actual brightness-gray relationship is determined for each pixel, as to associate brightness to grayscale requires associating specific pixel values on the display device with the observed brightness the physical pixel outputs.) a central processing module, configured to determine an actual gray-level value offset of each pixel based on the actual brightness-gray relationship of each pixel and a preset brightness-gray relationship;(Wang Col. 2 Line 15 “The calculation module is configured to determine a target input grayscale corresponding to a preset target brightness value according to an actual gamma curve value, wherein actual gamma curve value is obtained by testing the display panel. The adjustment module is configured to set a difference between the original input grayscale and the target input grayscale as a grayscale compensation value of the non-uniform block.” Col. 2 Line 40 “using the calculation module to determine a target input grayscale corresponding to the preset target brightness value according to the actual gamma curve value; using an adjustment module to set a difference between the original input grayscale and the target input grayscale as a grayscale compensation value of the non-uniform block; transmitting the grayscale compensation value to the display panel, and setting a sum of the grayscale compensation value and the original input grayscale of the non-uniform block as a new input grayscale of the non-uniform block in the display panel, to eliminate the non-uniform block of the current image.” Col. 6 Line 35 “The professional apparatus can be used to detect and identify the non-uniform block (area) of the current image, analyze the pixel distribution characteristic according to the captured current image, and identify the non-uniform according to algorithm. There are many algorithms for detecting the non-uniform area, but the present disclosure is not limited to particular algorithm.” Note: Wang teaches that a gray-level offset value for each pixel in need of correcting is determined by inputting the preset target brightness into the actual gamma curve to obtain the input grayscale value that will output the desired brightness. The difference between this grayscale value that gives the intended, correct brightness and the original grayscale that gives the actual brightness with Mura is found and added to the original input grayscale value.) and an adjustment module, configured to perform brightness compensation on each pixel to form improved display image data based on the actual gray-level value offset of each pixel.(Wang Col. 2 Line 40 teaches that once the compensation offset for a non-uniform region of pixels experiencing the same amount of Mura is determined the original input grayscale values of the pixels can have the offset applied so that the output brightness becomes the target preset brightness.)
Regarding claim 12,
Wang teaches:
The Demura compensating system for a micro display panel according to claim 7, wherein the adjustment module is configured to: acquire the actual gray-level value offset of each pixel from the central processing module; perform brightness compensation on each pixel to form the improved display image data based on the actual gray-level value offset of each pixel; and transmit the improved display image data to the micro display panel. (Wang Col. 2 Line 40, cited in the rejection of claim 7, teaches that a gray-level value offset value is determined. Specific to each pixel in need of compensation, the grayscale offset is taught to be added to the original grayscale value so that its output brightness will be the target preset brightness. It is implicit that the corrected image has been transmitted to the display panel, as Wang teaches the panel’s output brightness for the pixel that was offset is now corrected.)
Regarding claims 14, 4,
Wang teaches:
The Demura compensating system for a micro display panel according to claim 7, wherein, the adjustment module is configured to adjust the gray-level value for each pixel according to the actual gray-level value offset of each pixel, wherein a bit depth of each pixel is 2 bits, 4 bits, or 8 bits(Wang Col. 8 Line 53 “Tx is the reference output brightness value, T255 is the output brightness value corresponding to the input grayscale with a value of 255, T0 is the output brightness value corresponding to the input grayscale with a value of 0” Note: Wang teaches a grayscale value of its pixels between 0 and 255. This is a known size of 8 bits, a common size for color spaces with 256 (2^8) total variations that can be displayed.)
Regarding claim 17,
Wang teaches:
A micro display device for a micro display panel, comprising: the Demura compensating system of claim 7.
As Wang has already been shown to teach a display device and panel analogous to a micro display device and panel, and the system of claim 7 has already been rejected, claim 17 is rejected under the same rationale.
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.
Claims 2, 8, are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wang (US 11211021B2) in view of Pyun (US 11615730 B2).
Regarding claim 8, 2,
Wang teaches:
The Demura compensating system for a micro display panel according to claim 7, wherein, the calculation module is configured to: acquire the initial display image from the image acquisition module; (Wang Col. 1 Line 25, cited previously, teaches the acquiring of an initial display image by capturing the display device. Wang Abstract and Col. 2 Line 15 teach that the image data, or simply the image as the computer views it, provided to the display device is known as they grayscale values of the individual pixels is known, and can be edited.) transform the initial display image into an initial gray-level image;(Note: The specifications ¶43 state “In step 02, an actual brightness-gray relationship of each pixel is determined according to a brightness value and an initial gray-level value of each pixel in the initial display image. Since the brightness value and the gray-level value of each pixel show a liner relationship in the micro display panel, the actual brightness-gray relationship of each pixel is also liner.”. Thus, A “gray-level image” is simply the gray-scale values of an image’s pixels. This has already been shown to be known to Wang in Wang Abstract and Col. 2 Line 15 teach that the entire grayscale values of the image’s pixels are known.) and determine an actual gray coefficient of each pixel based on a relationship of an actual gray-level value and an actual brightness value of each pixel according to the initial gray-level image,(Wang Col. 8 Line 27
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Note: Wang Abstract, Col. 2 Line 15, and Col. 2 Line 40, cited previously, all teach that non-uniform regions with the same amount of Mura can be compensated by finding a specific gamma curve, or gamma mathematic model, that models the non-linear relationship between how the input grayscale value becomes the actual output brightness on the display. Wang’s relationship of output brightness = input grayscalegamma, is simply a modelling of relationships to show that it is the specific gamma curve (represented by gamma) that maps an input grayscale to output brightness. As the brightness is determined from a captured image of the display, it is of course not actually solved for via an equation. Thus, the claims “actual-grey coefficient” based on the actual brightness and actual gray values is the claims gamma curve.) wherein, the relationship of the actual gray-level value and the actual brightness value of a pixel is that: L1=K1xG1, wherein, L1 is an actual brightness value of the pixel, G1 is an actual gray-level value of the pixel, KL is the actual gray coefficient, (Note: The claim defines the equation “L1=K1xG1” as describing the relationship between actual gray level and actual brightness, it is not an equation that is, or even can, be solved for to get L1. L1 is the brightness of a given pixel obtained by capturing the display, seen both in Wang Col. 1 Line 32, cited previously, and the specifications ¶4 “The Demura technology belongs to a kind of external compensation technology, and currently this technology is mainly to illuminate a backplane of a display panel, through a Charge-coupled device (CCD) optical camera, to extract a luminance signal, and detect unevenness of a display image.” L1 is never either by Wang or by the present application solved for with the equation. The relationship “L1=K1xG1” is the same as Wang’s output brightness = inputbrightnessgamma, where the coefficient K is the specific gamma curve gamma.)
While Wang teaches the above-described relationship expressed through the provided equation Wang does not specify that the coefficient is a positive integer. A coefficient in an equation that can describes how actual brightness is obtained from a coefficient and an input gray value that is specified to specifically be an integer is found in Pyun which teaches wherein, the relationship of the actual gray-level value and the actual brightness value of a pixel wherein, L1 is an actual brightness value of the pixel, G1 is an actual gray-level value of the pixel, KL is the actual gray coefficient and K1 is a positive integer. (Col. 2 Line 38
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Col. 13 Line 8
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Note: Pyun teaches that a formula to calculate how luminance, aka actual brightness, corresponds to input gray levels. The luminance/actual brightness GRAY_LUM is analogous to the claims actual brightness L1 which is calculated by applying the coefficient to the input gray level/grayscale value. In the claim this input gray level value is G1, in Pyun it is GRAY. A gray coefficient that is a positive integer that is applied to the actual/input gray level value K1 is MAX_GRAY in Pyun, As seen from Pyun Col. 13 Line 8, the gray level system used is the common 0-255 scale, which makes the coefficient MAX_GRAY 255 always, teaching that the coefficient will always be a positive integer.)
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Wang with Pyun where the coefficient in the equation that describes a relationship between actual brightness and actual graylevel is a positive integer.
There are several reasons that would motivate one to do so, many DeMura compensation approaches use flash memory to store compensation values like the present invention, it is common for many types of flash memory to only accept integers, and for some to only accept unsigned integers. The coefficient is implicitly required for compensation in the present system and many DeMura compensation methods. If the coefficient is not an integer or positive then the compensation values that we will get will be either not positive or not integers, making them impossible to store in many flash memory devices which only accept integers, or unsigned integers.
Claims 13 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wang (US 11211021 B2) in view of Liu (US 11257465 B2).
Regarding claim 13,
Wang teaches:
The Demura compensating system for a micro display panel according to claim 12, further comprising
While Wang teaches the use of RAM and a display panel analogous to micro display panel it does not detail that it is static random-access memory (SRAM). This is taught by Liu which teaches a static random-access memory (SRAM), electrically connected with the adjustment module and the display panel, wherein the adjustment module is configured to perform brightness compensation on each pixel and send improved brightness data of each pixel to the SRAM,(Liu Col. 4 Line 5 “The brightness-unevenness compensation (Demura) method, a brightness-unevenness compensation (Demura) device and the display panel of the present disclosure adopt a dynamically variable block mode, and define a format of each compensation data group as a combination of a block identifier and a compensation value, thereby a capacity of a flash and a capacity of an SRAM (Static Random-Access Memory) in a TCON is saved; a block size of 8×8 pixels is used for a conventional mura, and a block size with a higher precision is selected for a smaller mura, a mura can be compensated with a higher precision under the condition of effectively saving memory space. Taking a flash with a capacity of 8M bytes as an example, for 3 planes and 12 bits, 15,000 groups of a block size of 4×4 pixels are compensated at most, or 4,300 groups of a block size of 2×2 pixels are compensated at most, or 1,100 groups of a block size of 1×1 pixel are compensated at most. Therefore, Under the condition of saving the capacity of the flash and the capacity of the SRAM in the TCON, mura with different sizes can be compensated effectively, and the dynamic variable block mode can realize differential compensation of different panels.” Note: Liu teaches that compensation data for pixels is stored in SRAM along with identifying information associating it to specific pixel groups. Liu also teaches that the SRAM is in communication with the flash memory that will more concretely store the compensation data. Liu teaches that from using the SRAM, flash memory, and timing controller, different mura for different sized groups of pixels can be compensated.) when all of the improved brightness data of all of the pixels are sent to the SRAM to form whole improved image data, the SRAM is configured to send the whole improved image data to the display panel.(As Liu Col. 4 Line 5 cited above teaches, the brightness compensation data stored to flash memory is loaded into SRAM so that can be used to apply to the image data to properly compensate it. As it is the SRAM that is used to handle and apply the DeMura compensation, it is implicit that when the display shows the compensated data it would have obtained it from the SRAM.)
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Wang with Liu where the brightness compensation is adjusted/applied in the SRAM where it is then sent to the display.
There are several reasons that would motivate one to do so, SRAM as opposed to other RAM types like DRAM does not require periodic refresh cycles which introduce the possibility of corrupting the data. As the present systems aim to compensate display errors by adjusting values with an offset it is critical that the correction values themselves do not get corrupted so as to properly compensate for Mura.
Claims 5, 15, 20, are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wang (US 11211021 B2) in view of Sasaki (US 10985302 B2)
Regarding claim 15,5,
Wang teaches:
The Demura compensating system for a micro display panel according to claim 7, wherein,
While Wang teaches a display analogous to a micro display it does not detail that specifically that inorganic micro LEDs are used. This is taught by Sasaki which teaches the micro display panel is a micro LED display panel comprising inorganic micro LEDs (Sasaki ¶3 “The use of inorganic micro-LEDs (uLEDs) in a display would provide a very high efficiency because the display would not use color filters and polarizers to absorb light”)
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Wang with Sasaki where the display panel used is a micro display panel comprising inorganic micro LEDs.
There are several reasons that would motivate one to do so, DeMura issues of uneven output brightness is more common among display types like micro displays where the small size of their pixels and LEDs make a chance of failure higher. If the goal is to develop an accurate and effective DeMura compensation system, it would be best to employ it for a display type that would actually make use of the compensation such as a micro LED display panel.
Regarding claim 20,
Wang teaches:
The micro display device for a micro display panel according to claim 17, wherein a standard gray coefficient is larger than the actual gray coefficient of a pixel. (Wang Fig. 4, cited above in the rejection of claims 6/16, has been shown to teach this exact same claim body language)
Wang does not however specifically detail that its LEDs can be inorganic micro LEDs, this is taught by Sasaki which teaches the micro display panel comprises inorganic micro LEDs; (Sasaki ¶3 “The use of inorganic micro-LEDs (uLEDs) in a display would provide a very high efficiency because the display would not use color filters and polarizers to absorb light”)
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Wang with Sasaki where the display panel used is a micro display panel comprising inorganic micro LEDs.
There are several reasons that would motivate one to do so, DeMura issues of uneven output brightness is more common among display types like micro displays where the small size of their pixels and LEDs make a chance of failure higher. If the goal is to develop an accurate and effective DeMura compensation system, it would be best to employ it for a display type that would actually make use of the compensation such as a micro LED display panel.
Claims 18, 19, are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wang (US 11211021 B2) in view of Liu (US 11257465 B2) and further in view of Lamkin (US 20190246097 A1)
Regarding claim 18,
Wang teaches:
The micro display device for a micro display panel according to claim 17, wherein, the micro display device further comprising: the adjustment module.
While Wang has already been shown to teach the adjustment module’s functions it does not detail specifically the use of flash memory. This is found in Liu which teaches
a flash memory, having a flash memory module and formed on a surface of the second end of the circuit board and electrically connected with the circuit board;(Liu Col. 1 Line 33, cited previously, teaches a flash memory that would implicitly be connected to the circuit board as it is in communication with the display and other hardware components.)
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Wang with Liu where the device leverages flash memory on its circuit board.
There are several reasons that would motivate one to do so, if one wished for the speed and efficiency of the system to be improved a fast type of memory could be used to handle the large amount of display data to store, such as flash memory.
Liu does not directly specify the use of a CPU attached to a circuit board, this is taught by Lamkin which teaches a circuit board, having a first end and a second end;(Lamkin ¶28 “FIG. 23 illustrates additional details of the flexible circuit board of FIG. 22, according to certain embodiments;”
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Note: An “end” of a circuit board, aka its two opposite sides/regions, will of course be found on any normal circuit board. As seen above, Lamkin’s board has a left and right, as well as top and bottom opposite ends, where electricity flows to all corners.) a micro display panel, formed on a surface of the first end of the circuit board and electrically connected with the circuit board;(Lamkin ¶5 “In such embodiments, an array of small, high-resolution micro displays (e.g., display facets) of custom sizes and shapes are formed and then assembled on a larger, flexible circuit board that may then be formed into a 3D shape (e.g., a semispherical surface)” Note: Lamkin teaches micro displays electrically connected to a circuit board.) a support base, formed on the other surface of the first end of the circuit board opposite to the micro display panel;(Whether or not a circuit board has a base and where said base is located is irrelevant, and introduces no new content. Any circuit board that exists in an actual device, not a standalone board, must have some form of support base to attach it to the case or device it is in.) and a central processing unit, wherein the central processing unit has the central processing module (Lamkin ¶83 “Typical imaging systems propagate a single data stream to/from a high-powered processor (e.g., a CPU or GPU), which may or may not serialize the data for manipulation.” Note: Lamkin previously details a circuit board with an attached micro display panel, here a processor that can be a CPU will serialize the data for manipulation before being provided to the display. It is implicit that this processor would be on the circuit board with the display, and could be placed at any location on any end of the circuit board and the core functions it performs would be the same.)
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Wang with Lamkin where the display device and panel have a circuit board which connects a CPU and the micro display panel and device, where the CPU handles the central processing and adjustment module.
There are several reasons that would motivate one to do so, the CPU excels at performing different logic tasks quickly it would be obvious to gain its benefits by placing the adjustment module instructions in the CPU, and similarly connecting the CPU with other display device components via a circuit board, the near universally used means for connecting hardware components on nearly all electronic devices.
Regarding claim 19,
Wang teaches:
The micro display device for a micro display panel according to claim 18, wherein, the adjustment module further adjusts the gray-level value for each pixel based on the actual gray-level value offset of each pixel, wherein a bit depth of each pixel is 2 bits, 4 bits, or 8 bits.
Other than the preamble, which has already been shown to be taught, the content of this claim is identical to claims 4 and 14, rejected previously, and is thus rejected under the same rationale.
Conclusion
Regarding claim 16, 6:
Wang teaches:
The Demura compensating system for a micro display panel according to claim 9, wherein, the standard gray coefficient is larger than the actual gray coefficient of a pixel. (Wang
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Note: As clarified by the 122(b) rejection of claims 9/3 above, the “gray level compensation formula” will not work as presented without further detail specifying how a conversion to grayscale is done. However, the intended meaning of this claim can be interpreted, if the standard gray coefficient is larger the offset (although not actually usable, as stated above) will be positive and increase the actual grayscale value, and if it is smaller it will be negative and decrease the actual grayscale values. As seen above in Fig. 4 Wang teaches both types of offsets.)
Regarding claim 10,
Wang teaches:
The Demura compensating system for a micro display panel according to claim 9, further comprising a flash memory module, wherein the calculation module is configured to transmit the actual gray coefficient of each pixel (Wang Abstract Col. 8 Line 27, cited previously, teaches that the actual gray coefficient for each pixel is found and teaches that it can be used to calculate the offset used to compensate the actual grayscale value. As it is first calculated then later used in another computation Wang implicitly teaches that the coefficient must be stored and transmitted in some manner.)
While Wang teaches the storing and transmission of the actual gray coefficient of each pixel it does not teach that it is transmitted to flash memory specifically. The use of flash memory in a DeMura compensation system is taught by Liu which teaches transmit the actual gray compensation data of each pixel to the flash memory module, and the central processing module is configured to acquire the actual gray compensation data of each pixel from the flash memory module. (Liu Col. 1 Line 33 “The Demura technology is performed through following steps: firstly, taking displaying pictures of a display panel at different gray-scales by a CCD camera, obtaining or extracting mura information of the display panel, then, obtaining gray-scale compensation data of the mura by an algorithm according to between brightness and darkness difference of the displaying pictures, and finally obtaining a compensation table (Demura table) of a selected gray-scale, using to be called by a hardware and corrected by the hardware. The compensation table is usually burned in a storage device (such as, flash). After a timing controller (Tcon IC or TCON) is powered on, gray-scale data to-be-displayed is compensated by the gray-scale compensation data to obtain compensated gray-scale data,” Note: Liu teaches that the values which are added to grayscale values to compensate for DeMura are stored on flash memory. Liu teaches that once stored, the data is used to apply the compensations to the grayscale data to correct it, thus teaching that data about grayscale values of an image can be stored and transmitted to flash memory.)
Regarding claim 11,
Wang teaches:
The Demura compensating system for a micro display panel according to claim 10,
While Liu teaches the actual gray coefficients of each pixel are found and stored to memory, and mentions the use of RAM, it does not discuss transmitting to and from RAM. Using RAM with flash memory to handle Demura compensation is found in Liu which teaches further comprising a system random-access memory (RAM) electrically connected with the flash memory module (Liu Col. 2 Line 4 “As shown in FIG. 1, a capacity demand for the flash and SRAM(Static Random-Access Memory) in the TCON greatly increases, and then a hardware cost increases. However, a Demura flash used in a current 4K screen usually only has a size of 8 Mbits.” Note: Liu Col. 1 Line 33, cited above, teaches that the TCON, timing controller, is what will access the grayscale compensation data, which it previously states is stored on the flash memory. Here, Liu teaches the TCON is also in communication with RAM. Thus, Liu has been shown to teach a connection between RAM and the flash memory.) and the central processing module, wherein the calculation module is configured to transmit the actual gray data to the flash memory module, the flash memory module is configured to transmit the actual gray coefficient of pixels to the system RAM, and the central processing module is configured to acquire the actual gray data of each pixel from the system RAM.(Liu Col. 1 Line 50 “However, the existing Demura technology performs data compression according to a fixed block size (a block capacity or an area range). For example, a block size of a display panel with a resolution of 3840×2160 commonly is 8×8 pixels, that is, pixels with a size of 8×8 each share a compensation (data) value, so each compensation table stored in the flash has a size of 481×271, and compensation data of the pixels is obtained by an interpolation calculation. The existing Demura technology has the characteristics of high efficiency and cost saving, but also has some following shortcomings.
1. A mura with a size smaller than 8×8 pixels cannot be compensated due to a precision limitation of block size;
2. A mura with a high sharpness, such as an H-line mura, a V-line mura, etc., cannot be addressed by an interpolation calculation method, and the compensation effect is poor;
3. The above problems can be addressed through improving the precision of the block size, however, a size of the required compensation table increases correspondingly when the precision of the block size is improved uniformly, and then the amount of information (data) increases. As shown in FIG. 1, a capacity demand for the flash and SRAM(Static Random-Access Memory) in the TCON greatly increases, and then a hardware cost increases. However, a Demura flash used in a current 4K screen usually only has a size of 8 Mbits.”
Note: The full version of the citation previously provided can be seen above. Here, it can be seen that Liu handles Demura correction by applying the compensation to groups of pixels. Liu specifically teaches that it is difficult to have increasingly precise, smaller block sizes as it places a strain on the size of the compensation table (flash memory) and the available RAM capacity, thus teaching that the pixel data is stored in and transmitted to/from RAM and flash memory.)
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ALAN GREGORY HAKALA whose telephone number is (571)272-7863. The examiner can normally be reached 8:00am-5:00pm.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, King Poon can be reached at (571) 270-0728. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/ALAN GREGORY HAKALA/ Examiner, Art Unit 2617 /KING Y POON/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2617
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