DETAILED ACTION
This office action is in response to the application filed on 04/30/2025. Claims 1-2, 5-10, 12, 14-24 are pending and are examined.
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers submitted under 35 U.S.C. 119(a)-(d), which papers have been placed of record in the file.
Information Disclosure Statement
The reference(s) listed on the Information Disclosure Statement(s) submitted on 05/13/2025 has/have been considered by the examiner (see attached PTO-1449).
Claim Objections
Claims 2 and 17 are objected to because of the following informalities:
In Claim 2, line 5, “an - inverse-quantized” should likely read - - an inverse-quantized - - .
In Claim 17, line 2, “multiple group of” should likely read - - multiple groups of - - .
Examiner respectfully requests from Applicant verification and requires appropriate correction regarding these matters.
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)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1-2, 9-10, 12, 14-16, and 21-24 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by Hur, US Patent Application Publication No.: 2026/0019628 A1 (please note the US Provisional Application No.: 63388974, filed 07/13/2022), hereby Hur.
Regarding Claims 1, 12, 14-15, and 23-24, Hur discloses a method of encoding a geometry of point cloud frames of a point cloud sequence into a bitstream, an apparatus of encoding a geometry of point cloud frames of a point cloud sequence into a bitstream, a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium, a method of decoding a geometry of point cloud frames of a point cloud sequence from a bitstream, an apparatus of decoding a geometry of point cloud frames of a point cloud sequence from a bitstream, and a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium (Figs. 20 and 23; Figs. 1-4, 7-9, 19, and 22,, disclosing hardware features of point cloud encoding/decoding), comprising:
“representing geometry of each point cloud frame by a 3-dimensional (3D) decomposition tree comprising leaf nodes (Fig. 4, [0127]-[0132]; Figs. 1-3, 7-9, 19, and 22; Figs. 20 and 23);
associating each leaf node of the 3D decomposition tree with a cuboid volume comprising at least one point of the point cloud (Fig. 4, [0127]-[0132]; Figs. 1-3, 7-9, 19, and 22; Figs. 20 and 23);
using Trisoup information of a vertex located on an edge of the cuboid volume associated with a leaf node of the 3D decomposition tree to be representative of presence of the vertex on the edge and of vertex position along the edge (Fig. 4, [0127]-[0132] and [0136]-[0137]; Figs. 1-3, 7-9, 19, and 22; Figs. 20 and 23);
performing intra-prediction based encoding on Trisoup information of a first point cloud frame, the intra-prediction based encoding making use of information extracted from the first point cloud frame (Figs. 20 and 23, and [0363]-[0364], [0405], [0432], [0438], disclosing trisoup-based inter and intra coding; Fig. 4, [0127]-[0132] and [0136]-[0137]; Figs. 1-3, 7-9, 19, and 22; Figs. 20 and 23);
obtaining reconstructed Trisoup information of the first point cloud frame from the Trisoup information of the first point cloud frame and storing the reconstructed Trisoup information as reference Trisoup information (Figs. 20 and 23, and [0363]-[0364], [0366], [0405], [0432], [0438], disclosing trisoup-based inter and intra coding, and reconstruction and reference storage (Figs. 20 and 23); Fig. 4, [0127]-[0132] and [0136]-[0137]; Figs. 1-3, 7-9, 19, and 22; Figs. 20 and 23); and
performing inter-prediction based encoding on Trisoup information of at least one second point cloud frame of the point cloud sequence from the stored reference Trisoup information (Figs. 20 and 23, and [0363]-[0364], [0366], [0405], [0432], [0438], disclosing trisoup-based inter and intra coding, and reconstruction and reference storage (Figs. 20 and 23); Fig. 4, [0127]-[0132] and [0136]-[0137]; Figs. 1-3, 7-9, 19, and 22; Figs. 20 and 23) by:
determining temporal prediction Trisoup information from the reference Trisoup information for each second point cloud frame (Figs. 20 and 23, and [0363]-[0364], [0366], [0405], [0432], [0438], disclosing trisoup-based inter and intra coding, and reconstruction and reference storage (Figs. 20 and 23); Fig. 4, [0127]-[0132] and [0136]-[0137]; Figs. 1-3, 7-9, 19, and 22; Figs. 20 and 23);
calculating, for each second point cloud frame, Trisoup information residual as a difference between the Trisoup information of the second point cloud frame and the temporal prediction Trisoup information of the second point cloud frame (Figs. 20 and 23, and [0363]-[0364], [0366], [0405], [0432], [0438], disclosing trisoup-based inter and intra coding, and reconstruction, reference storage, and residual information (Figs. 20 and 23); Fig. 4, [0127]-[0132] and [0136]-[0137]; Figs. 1-3, 7-9, 19, and 22; Figs. 20 and 23);
encoding the Trisoup information residual of each second point cloud frame into a bitstream (Figs. 20 and 23, and [0363]-[0364], [0366], [0405], [0432], [0438], disclosing trisoup-based inter and intra coding, and reconstruction, reference storage, residual information, and outputting the bitstream (Figs. 20 and 23); Fig. 4, [0127]-[0132] and [0136]-[0137]; Figs. 1-3, 7-9, 19, and 22; Figs. 20 and 23); and
obtaining reconstructed Trisoup information for each second point cloud frame by adding the Trisoup information residual and the temporal prediction Trisoup information and storing the reconstructed Trisoup information as reference Trisoup information (Figs. 20 and 23, and [0363]-[0364], [0366], [0405], [0432], [0438], disclosing trisoup-based inter and intra coding, and reconstruction, reference storage, residual information, and outputting the bitstream (Figs. 20 and 23); Fig. 4, [0127]-[0132] and [0136]-[0137]; Figs. 1-3, 7-9, 19, and 22; Figs. 20 and 23).”
Regarding Claims 2 and 16, Hur discloses:
“obtaining a quantized Trisoup information residual by quantizing the Trisoup information residual; obtaining an - inverse-quantized Trisoup information residual by inverse-quantizing the quantized Trisoup information residual (Figs. 3, 20, and 23, and [0149], [0333], [0335], and [0438]-[0440], disclosing quantization/inverse quantization; Figs. 20 and 23, and [0363]-[0364], [0366], [0405], [0432], [0438], disclosing trisoup-based inter and intra coding, and reconstruction, reference storage, residual information, and outputting the bitstream (Figs. 20 and 23); Fig. 4, [0127]-[0132] and [0136]-[0137]; Figs. 1-3, 7-9, 19, and 22; Figs. 20 and 23); and
obtaining the reconstructed Trisoup information by adding the inverse-quantized Trisoup information residual and the temporal prediction Trisoup information (Figs. 3, 20, and 23, and [0149], [0333], [0335], and [0438]-[0440], disclosing quantization/inverse quantization; Figs. 20 and 23, and [0363]-[0364], [0366], [0405], [0432], [0438], disclosing trisoup-based inter and intra coding, and reconstruction, reference storage, residual information, and outputting the bitstream (Figs. 20 and 23); Fig. 4, [0127]-[0132] and [0136]-[0137]; Figs. 1-3, 7-9, 19, and 22; Figs. 20 and 23).”
Regarding Claims 9 and 21, Hur discloses:
“wherein Trisoup information of a current point cloud frame is further representative of at least one centroid point, each centroid point being associated with a cuboid volume ([0138], disclosing a centroid value; Figs. 20 and 23, and [0363]-[0364], [0366], [0405], [0432], [0438], disclosing trisoup-based inter and intra coding, and reconstruction, reference storage, residual information, and outputting the bitstream (Figs. 20 and 23); Fig. 4, [0127]-[0132] and [0136]-[0137]; Figs. 1-3, 7-9, 19, and 22; Figs. 20 and 23).”
Regarding Claims 10 and 22, Hur discloses:
“wherein the Trisoup information of the vertex located on the edge of the cuboid volume associated with the leaf node of the 3D decomposition tree is representative of at least one residual value, each residual value being associated with a cuboid volume (Figs. 20 and 23, and [0363]-[0364], [0366], [0405], [0432], [0438], disclosing trisoup-based inter and intra coding, and reconstruction, reference storage, residual information, and outputting the bitstream (Figs. 20 and 23); Fig. 4, [0127]-[0132] and [0136]-[0137]; Figs. 1-3, 7-9, 19, and 22; Figs. 20 and 23).”
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 5-8 and 17-20 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:
Examiner notes that multiple references cited disclose point cloud compression coding. For example, the following references show similar features in the claims, although not relied upon: Lasserre (US 2024/0135597 A1), Figs. 1 and 7-8.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to KATHLEEN M WALSH whose telephone number is (571)270-0423. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8:00 AM - 5:00 PM.
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/KATHLEEN M WALSH/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2482
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