Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
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 § 101
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.
Claim 19 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to non-statutory subject matter. The claim(s) does/do not fall within at least one of the four categories of patent eligible subject matter because claims 19-20 describe “a computer program product”.
Further, Applicant's specification fails to explicitly define the scope of “a computer program product”. Thus, in giving the term its plain meaning (see MPEP 2111.01), the claimed “computer program product” is considered to include data signals per se. Data signals per se are not statutory as they fail to fall into one of the four statutory categories of invention.
As an additional note, a non-transitory computer readable medium having executable programming instructions stored thereon is considered statutory as non-transitory computer readable media excludes transitory data signals.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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.
Claim(s) 1-20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Zhang et al. (US 20230328276 A1).
Regarding Claim 10, Zhang et al. teaches an electronic apparatus, wherein the electronic apparatus comprises a memory, a processor, and a program stored in the memory and capable of running on the processor, and the program, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to implement operations (Paragraph 202; Paragraph 236) comprising:
performing downsampling on a to-be-processed image, and dividing the to-be-processed image into square blocks of a same size (Paragraph 57; Paragraph 72);
performing inter-frame prediction on a current block based on a single-motion-vector mode, to determine a best cost and a corresponding prediction direction (Paragraph 54; Paragraphs 140-142; Paragraph 193);
performing inter-frame prediction on the current block based on a pseudo-affine transformation mode by using the prediction direction as a search direction of the pseudo-affine transformation mode, to obtain an affine transformation cost (Paragraphs 5-10; Paragraphs 31-33; Paragraphs 97-102; Paragraphs 158-166); and
comparing a value of the best cost with a value of the affine transformation cost, and determining, based on a comparison result, a best mode for performing pre-analysis inter-frame prediction on the current block (Paragraphs 31-33; Paragraphs 97-102; Paragraphs 158-166; Paragraphs 202-211; Paragraph 260).
Regarding Claim 11, Zhang et al. teaches the electronic apparatus according claim 10, wherein the performing inter-frame prediction on a current block based on a single-motion-vector mode, to determine a best cost and a corresponding prediction direction comprises: performing motion estimation on the current block based on the single-motion-vector mode, to determine rate distortion costs predicted in forward, backward and bi-directional; and comparing the rate distortion costs of each prediction direction to obtain the best cost and a prediction direction corresponding to the best cost (Paragraphs 31-33; Paragraphs 97-102; Paragraphs 158-166; Paragraphs 202-211; Paragraph 260).
Regarding Claim 12, Zhang et al. teaches the electronic apparatus according claim 10, wherein the performing inter-frame prediction on the current block based on a pseudo-affine transformation mode by using the prediction direction as a search direction of the pseudo-affine transformation mode, to obtain an affine transformation cost comprises: dividing the current block into four square sub-blocks of a same size; performing motion estimation on each sub-block in a reference frame based on the search direction, to obtain a corresponding final motion vector; obtaining, based on final motion vectors of the four sub-blocks, a predicted block corresponding to the current block in the reference frame; and obtaining the affine transformation cost based on a difference between the current block and the predicted block (Paragraphs 31-33; Paragraph 66; Paragraphs 97-102; Paragraphs 123-124; Paragraphs 153-166; Paragraphs 202-211; Paragraph 260).
Regarding Claim 13, Zhang et al. teaches the electronic apparatus according claim 12, wherein the performing motion estimation on each sub-block in a reference frame based on the search direction, to obtain a corresponding final motion vector comprises: determining search start points for first three sub-blocks, and respectively performing motion estimation on the three sub-blocks in the reference frame by using the search start points, to obtain corresponding reference blocks and coding costs; determining final motion vectors of the three sub-blocks based on the coding costs; and obtaining a final motion vector of a fourth sub-block based on the final motion vectors of the three sub-blocks (Paragraphs 31-33; Paragraph 66; Paragraphs 97-102; Paragraphs 123-124; Paragraphs 153-166; Paragraphs 202-211; Paragraph 260).
Regarding Claim 14, Zhang et al. teaches the electronic apparatus according claim 13, wherein the determining final motion vectors of the three sub-blocks based on the coding costs comprises: when the coding costs are less than or equal to a specified threshold, using the search start points as the final motion vectors of the sub-blocks (Paragraphs 31-33; Paragraph 66; Paragraphs 97-102; Paragraphs 123-124; Paragraphs 153-166; Paragraphs 202-211; Paragraph 260).
Regarding Claim 15, Zhang et al. teaches the electronic apparatus according claim 14, wherein the determining final motion vectors of the three sub-blocks based on the coding costs comprises: when the coding costs are greater than the specified threshold, performing a hexagon-based search based on the search start points, to obtain the final motion vectors of the sub-blocks (Paragraphs 31-33; Paragraph 66; Paragraphs 97-102; Paragraphs 123-124; Paragraphs 153-166; Paragraphs 202-211; Paragraph 260).
Regarding Claim 16, Zhang et al. teaches the electronic apparatus according claim 12, wherein the obtaining, based on final motion vectors of the four sub-blocks, a predicted block corresponding to the current block in the reference frame comprises: obtaining four predicted sub-blocks respectively pointed to by the final motion vectors of the four sub-blocks in the reference frame; and splicing the four predicted sub-blocks to obtain the predicted block corresponding to the current block (Paragraphs 31-33; Paragraph 66; Paragraphs 97-102; Paragraphs 123-124; Paragraphs 153-175; Paragraphs 202-211; Paragraph 260).
Regarding Claim 17, Zhang et al. teaches the electronic apparatus according claim 10, wherein the determining, based on a comparison result, a best mode for performing pre-analysis inter-frame prediction on the current block comprises: when the value of the best cost is greater than or equal to the value of the affine transformation cost, determining the best mode is the pseudo-affine transformation mode; and when the value of the best cost is less than the value of the affine transformation cost, determining the best mode is the single-motion-vector mode (Paragraphs 31-33; Paragraph 54; Paragraph 66; Paragraphs 97-102; Paragraphs 123-124; Paragraphs 153-175; Paragraphs 202-211; Paragraph 260).
Method claims 1-8 are drawn to the method of using corresponding apparatus claims 10-17 and are rejected for the same reasons as used above.
Claim 9 is drawn to substantially the same limitations as claims 1 and 10 above, and is rejected for the same reasons as used above.
Non-transitory computer-readable storage medium claim 18 is drawn to the method claim 1 and is rejected for the same reasons as discussed above. Zhang et al. further teaches A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium, wherein the non-transitory computer- readable storage medium stores a computer program, and when the computer program is executed by a processor, the image pre-analysis method according to claim 1 is implemented (Paragraph 50).
Computer program product claims 19-20 are drawn to the method of claims 1-2 and are rejected for the same reasons as used above. Zhang et al. further teaches that a computer program product, wherein the computer program product stores a computer program, and when the computer program is executed by a processor, the image pre-analysis method according to claim 1 is implemented (Paragraph 50).
Conclusion
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/FARHAN MAHMUD/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2483
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