DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
1. The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Status of Claims
2. Claims 1-35 have been cancelled. Claims 36-54 have been submitted for examination and are pending.
Priority
3. Acknowledgment is made of applicant's claim for foreign priority under 35 U.S.C. § 119(a)-(d). The certified copy has been placed of record in the file.
Information Disclosure Statement
4. The information disclosure statement (IDS) was submitted on 06/20/2025. The submission is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR § 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Claim Objections
5. Claims 36-37, 39, 42, and 49 are objected to because of the following informalities:
Regarding claim 36, in technical terms it is not clear what is done when "mapping the base encoding parameters, the base quality factor and "the encoding quality factor". Also, it is not clear what is done when "mapping the encoding quality factor to a base quality factor ... "
The limitation “"a constant rate factor" used in claim 37 is unclear and vague. Is a constant bit rate meant?
Claim 39 is unclear since it is not clear what is meant by "modulating the enhancement quality factor".
Regarding claim 41, it is unclear why "the base quality factor" is received. In claim 1 the base quality factor has already been obtained through mapping the encoding quality factor. It is not clear what the "set of coefficients" represents.
Regarding claim 49, It is not understood what is meant by "determining a range of available bit per pixel values for the enhancement encoding ... ".
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
6. 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.
7. Claim 53 is 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.
Regarding claim 53, See MPEP 2173.05(g), “the use of functional language in a claim may fail "to provide a clear-cut indication of the scope of the subject matter embraced by the claim" and thus be indefinite.” In re Swinehart, 439 F.2d 210, 213 (CCPA 1971). For example, when claims merely recite a description of a problem to be solved or a function or result achieved by the invention, the boundaries of the claim scope may be unclear. Halliburton Energy Servs., Inc. v. M-I LLC, 514 F.3d 1244, 1255, 85 USPQ2d 1654, 1663 (Fed. Cir. 2008). This claim recites “an enhancement bit stream encoded using the enhancement encoding parameters as computed by the method of claim 36” in the body of the claim. The claim scope cannot be accurately ascertained since the function promised is not aligned with the function(s) in the body. Therefore, it is unclear what constitutes the claimed method of encoding.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
8. 35 U.S.C. § 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
9. Claim 53 is rejected under pre-AIA 35 U.S.C § 101 because the claimed inventions are directed to non-statutory subject matter as follow.
Claim 53 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. §101 because the claimed “enhancement bit stream” is not directed to one of the four statutory categories of invention. The claim is directed to information in the form of a bit stream and does not recite a process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter. The recitation that the enhancement bit stream is “encoded using the enhancement encoding parameters as computed by the method of claim 53” merely describes how the information was generated and does not transform the claimed information itself into statutory subject matter.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
10. 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.
11. 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.
(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.
12. Claims 36-54 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Meardi et al. (WO2020/188230A1) (hereinafter Meardi) (cited by IDS).
Regarding claim 36, Meardi discloses a method of computing encoding parameters for an encoding of an input video (e.g., see abstract; Figs. 1-5), the method comprising:
receiving an encoding quality factor indicating a desired visual quality for an encoding of the input video (e.g., see Fig. 5, page 16 line 26 to page 19 line 10: desired quality 510);
mapping the encoding quality factor to a base quality factor indicating a desired visual quality for a base encoding of the input video (e.g., see Fig. 5, page 16 line 26 to page 17 line 6: adjusting the operating parameters of the enhancement and/or base levels encoding components to provide this desired quality level 510 and further adjusting the operation of the base level and the enhancement level (including the encoding of level 1 and level 2 streams) to meet or aim towards the indication of a desired quality level 510; Fig. 5, page 18 lines 8-14: The indication of a desired quality level 510 may be independent of similar indications available for the base and/or enhancement layers. The quality controller 512 may map the indication of a desired quality level 510 to a number of base parameters 514 for controlling the base layer), the base encoding providing an encoding at a first level of quality (e.g., see Fig. 5, page 17, lines 1-6: the quality controller 512 outputs base parameters 514 which are used to encode the base level or layer of the hybrid stream);
obtaining, from a base encoder, base encoding parameters for the base quality factor (e.g., see figure 5; page 17, lines 1-6: the quality controller 512 outputs base parameters 514 which are used to encode the base level or layer of the hybrid stream); and
mapping the base encoding parameters, the base quality factor, and the encoding quality factor to enhancement encoding parameters for an enhancement encoding (e.g., see Fig. 5, page 18, line 6: The quality controller 512 is arranged to control the bit rates of the base and enhancement encoders so as to meet or aim for the indication of a desired quality level 510 with the presence of multiple resolutions. This again means that controlling the bit rates is a non-trivial operation, In certain case, the quantisation parameters Qi and Q2are different from the base parameters 514) wherein a combination of the base encoding and the enhancement encoding provide an encoding at a second level of quality that is higher than the first level of quality (e.g., see Figs.1-3, page 17, lines 1-9: higher resolution or level 2 enhancement layer; page 33, lines 9-11: higher level quality; also see Fig. 11, page 34, lines 10-18).
Regarding claim 37, Meardi discloses the method of claim 36, wherein the encoding quality factor is a constant rate factor for the combination of the base and enhancement encoding and the base quality factor is a constant rate factor for the base encoding, the base encoding being performed in a constant rate factor mode (e.g., see page 17, lines 15-26: The indication of a desired quality level 510 may be a form of Constant Rate, however, comparative Constant Rate Factors are typically designed for single encoding schemes, e.g., such as those that may be implemented at the base level; also see Figs. 1-5).
Regarding claim 38, Meardi discloses the method of claim 37, wherein the encoding quality factor and the base quality factor are constant for the encoding of the input video, and wherein the steps of obtaining the base encoding parameters and mapping the base encoding parameters to enhancement encoding parameters are performed for each frame of the input video (e.g., see page 23, lines 16-23: As such, different quantisation parameters may be determined for different frames with a constant indication of a desired quality level 610. The enhancement rate controller 602 thus is a dynamic system where the outputs of the components change per frame and for a given frame; also see Figs. 1-5).
Regarding claim 39, Meardi discloses the method of claim 38, wherein the enhancement encoding comprises a plurality of sublayers having different levels of quality, and the method further comprises: computing an enhancement quality factor as a function of the encoding quality factor and the base quality factor; modulating the enhancement quality factor based on the base encoding parameters; and mapping the modulated enhancement quality factor to quantisation parameters for each of the plurality of sublayers (e.g., see figure 6; page 19, lines 31-34: the quantisation parameters Q1 and Q2 are variable within the context of the selected static base parameters 514 to meet or attempt to meet the indication of desired quality 510);.
Regarding claim 40, Meardi discloses the method of claim 39, wherein the method comprises: mapping the modulated enhancement quality factor to quantisation step widths for each of the plurality of sublayers (e.g., see page 27, lines 24-26: quantisation step-width; Figs. 1-5).
Regarding claim 41, Meardi discloses the method of claim 40, comprising:
receiving the base quality factor (e.g., see page 18, lines 2-14: initial quality factor and quality factor for base mode; also see Figs. 1-5);
retrieving a set of coefficients based on the value of the base quality factor (e.g., see page 30, lines 25-29: coefficients; Figs. 10A-10B); and
computing the enhancement quality factor as a non-linear function of the base quality factor and the encoding quality factor, the non-linear function being configured based on the set of coefficients (e.g., see page 28 lines 31-35, page 32 lines 15-20: non-linear function; page 33, lines 13-25: coefficient).
Regarding claim 42, Meardi discloses the method of claim 40, wherein the input video is received at a first spatial resolution and the method comprises, on a frame-by-frame basis (e.g., Fig. 3, see page 9 lines 14-21: spatial dependencies; page 18 paragraphs 16-33: spatial scaling parameters such as using up/down sampling; page 16 lines 6-9, page 14 lines 30-34: frame-by-frame basis):
downsampling a current frame of the input video to create a downsampled frame at a second spatial resolution that is lower than the first spatial resolution (e.g., see page 18 paragraphs 16-33: spatial scaling parameters such as using up/down sampling; Figs. 1-3, page 5 lines 8-35, page 8 lines 10-23: downsampled input image);
instructing the base encoding of the downsampled frame using the base encoder to create a base encoded stream (e.g., see Figs. 1-3, page 5 lines 8-35, page 8 lines 10-23: downsampled input image);
generating a reconstruction of the current frame at the second spatial resolution from a decoding of the base encoded stream (e.g., Figs. 1-3, see page 9 lines 14-21: spatial dependencies; page 18 paragraphs 16-33: spatial scaling parameters such as using up/down sampling; page 8 lines 10-23, page 12 lines 10-34: reconstruction of the frame);
computing residual data for a first sublayer of the plurality of sublayers as a difference between the reconstruction of the current frame at the second spatial resolution and the downsampled current frame (e.g., see Fig. 5, page 17 lines 8-28: residuals and sub-layers of the enhancement streams; Fig. 11, page 34 lines 20-35);
encoding the residual data for the first sublayer using the quantisation step width for the first sublayer to generate encoded residual data for the first sublayer (e.g., see Fig. 5, page 17 lines 8-28: residuals and sub-layers of the enhancement streams; Fig. 11, page 34 lines 20-35); combining a decoding of the encoded residual data for the first sublayer with the reconstruction of the current frame to generate a corrected reconstruction of the current frame (e.g., see page 8 lines 10-23, page 12 lines 10-34: reconstruction of the frame); upsampling the corrected reconstruction of the current frame to the first spatial resolution (e.g., Figs. 1-3, see page 9 lines 14-21: spatial dependencies; page 18 paragraphs 16-33: spatial scaling parameters such as using up/down sampling); computing residual data for a second sublayer of the plurality of sublayers as a difference between the upsampled corrected reconstruction of the current frame and the current frame (e.g., see Fig. 5, page 17 lines 8-28: residuals and sub-layers of the enhancement streams; Fig. 11, page 34 lines 20-35; page 18 paragraphs 16-33: spatial scaling parameters such as using up/down sampling); and encoding the residual data for the second sublayer using the quantisation step width for the second sublayer to generate encoded residual data for the second sublayer (e.g., see Fig. 5, page 17 lines 8-28: residuals and sub-layers of the enhancement streams).
Regarding claim 43, Meardi discloses the method of any one of claims 36, wherein the method is applied on a frame-by-frame basis and the base encoding parameters comprise:
a frame type;
a frame size in bits; and
a quantisation metric for the frame (e.g., see page 21 lines 30-35: This may comprise an input similar to the encoding feedback 404 and 504 of Figures 4 and 5. The encoding parameter input 640 may comprise one or more operating parameters such as one or more of a frame type, a bit rate of the base layer, a minimum desired bit rate (e.g. as determined by the quality controller 512), and a target bit rate);
Regarding claim 44, Meardi discloses the method of claim 43, wherein: the frame type indicates one of:
an Intra I-frame, a Predicted P-frame, and a Bidirectional B-frame (e.g., see page 13 lines 23-25: intra or inter frame); and
the quantisation metric is an average quantisation parameter – QP for the frame (e.g., see Fig. 4, page 14 line 3-35: quantisation parameter).
Regarding claim 45, Meardi discloses the method of any one of claim 36, wherein mapping the encoding quality factor and mapping the base encoding parameters comprises using one or more look-up tables (e.g., see page 28 line 28-35: mapping function or lookup table).
Regarding claim 46, Meardi discloses the method of any one of claim 36, wherein mapping the encoding quality factor and mapping the base encoding parameters (e.g., see Fig. 5, page 16 line 26 to page 19 line 10: desired quality 510) comprises using one or more trained neural network architectures (e.g., see page 18 lines 16-24; Figs. 1-5).
Regarding claim 47, Meardi discloses the method of any one of claim 36, wherein mapping the encoding quality factor to the base quality factor (e.g., see Fig. 5, page 16 line 26 to page 19 line 10: desired quality 510) comprises: determining a base encoding type, the base encoding type being selected from a plurality of different available base encoding types based on the base encoder used for the base encoding; and configuring a mapping for the determined base encoding type (e.g., see page 18 lines 16-24: the desired quality input 510 is dependent on the encoding standard used to encode the video stream).
Regarding claim 48, Meardi discloses the method of any one of claim 36, wherein mapping the base encoding parameters, the base quality factor, and the encoding quality factor to enhancement encoding parameters (e.g., see Fig. 5, page 16 line 26 to page 19 line 10: desired quality 510) comprises: mapping a plurality of base encoding parameters, the base quality factor, and the encoding quality factor to quantisation step-widths and estimated bit rate parameters for the enhancement encoding (e.g., see page 27, lines 24-26: quantisation step-width; Figs. 1-5).
Regarding claim 49, Meardi discloses the method of claim 41, further comprising, for a given frame: determining a range of available bit per pixel values for the enhancement encoding; obtaining a set of encoding settings based on an encoding of a previous frame; using the range of available bit per pixel values and the set of encoding settings to adjust the enhancement encoding parameters; and repeating the method with the adjusted enhancement encoding parameters prior to encoding (page 22, line 1: determines a bit rate range, such as a maximum and minimum bit rate for the hybrid video stream (or for one or more of the individual enhancement streams (e.g., see Fig. 6, page 21 line 8-35: a target bit rate based on a previous encoding; also see Figs. 1-5).
Regarding claim 50, Meardi discloses the method of claim 49, wherein determining the range of available bit per pixel values for the enhancement encoding comprises: determining a first range of available bit per pixel values based on a set of encoding parameters (e.g., see page 14 lines 13-23: bit-per-picture or pixel; also see page 27 lines 9-12); determining a second range of available bit per pixel values based on a buffer arranged to store encoded bits from the base and enhancement encodings; and outputting minimum and maximum bit per pixel values as constrained by the first and second ranges (e.g., see page 22, lines 1-4: determines a bit rate range, such as a maximum and minimum bit rate for the hybrid video stream (or for one or more of the individual enhancement streams).
Regarding claim 51, this claim is an encoder claim of a method version as applied to claim 36 above, wherein the encoder performs the same limitations cited in claim 36, the rejections of which are incorporated herein. Furthermore, Meardi discloses encoder/decoder (see Figs. 1-3, 7A-7B).
Regarding claim 52, this claim is a non-transitory computer-readable medium claim of a method version as applied to claim 36 above, wherein the non-transitory computer-readable medium performs the same limitations cited in claim 36, the rejections of which are incorporated herein. Furthermore, Meardi discloses a non-transitory computer-readable medium (see page 35 lines 15-27).
Regarding claim 53, this claim is an enhancement bit stream encoded using the enhancement encoding parameters claim of a method version as applied to claim 36 above, wherein the enhancement bit stream encoded using the enhancement encoding parameters performs the same limitations cited in claim 36, the rejections of which are incorporated herein. Furthermore, Meardi discloses encoder/decoder (see Figs. 1-3, 7A-7B).
Regarding claim 54, this claim is an decoder claim of a method version as applied to claims 51 and 53 above, wherein the decoder performs the same limitations cited in claims 51 and 53, the rejections of which are incorporated herein. Furthermore, Meardi discloses encoder/decoder (see Figs. 1-3, 7A-7B).
Conclusion
13. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ON MUNG whose telephone number is (571) 270-7557 and whose direct fax number is (571) 270-8557. The examiner can normally be reached on Mon-Fri 9am - 6pm (ET).
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, JAMIE ATALA can be reached on (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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/ON S MUNG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2486
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