DETAILED ACTION
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 .
Preliminary Remarks
This is a reply to the amendments filed on 08/22/2025, in which, claims 1-6 and 8-10 are amended; claim 7 is cancelled; and claim 11 is newly added. Claims 1-6 and 8-11 remain pending in the present application with claims 1, 8, and 9 being independent claims.
When making claim amendments, the applicant is encouraged to consider the references in their entireties, including those portions that have not been cited by the examiner and their equivalents as they may most broadly and appropriately apply to any particular anticipated claim amendments.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements (IDS) submitted on January 06, 2026 and March 16, 2026 are in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97 and are being considered by the Examiner.
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 of this title, 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 1-6 and 8-11 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Duguid et al. (US 20230333552 A1, hereinafter referred to as “Duguid”) in view of Ren et al. (US 20140267282 A1, hereinafter referred to as “Ren”).
Regarding claim 1, Duguid discloses a method for providing an image data set from an image processing unit of an apparatus (see Duguid, paragraph [0057]: “The Direct Real-time Inputs may comprise data captured by one or more imaging devices (e.g., cameras). The imaging devices may comprise one or more cameras configured to capture multiple image views simultaneously”) to at least one display device for an operator of the apparatus (see Duguid, paragraph [0059]: “These pilot state Real-time Inputs may enable adaptive HMI elements to update the synthetic vision display to match the gaze direction of the pilot”).
Regarding claim 1, Duguid discloses all the claimed limitations with the exception of wherein the image data set comprises at least two levels of detail of at least one image element obtained from at least one of a sensor module, a database module or a receiving module.
Ren from the same or similar fields of endeavor discloses wherein the image data set comprises at least two levels of detail of at least one image element obtained from at least one of a sensor module, a database module or a receiving module (see Ren, paragraph [0033]: “The processor 108 identifies input commands that correspond to predetermined movement gestures in the data that the gesture recognition sensors 140 record in the vehicle. For example, the operator lowers an outstretched hand to increase the priority threshold and reduce the level of detail in the map display, and the operator raises the outstretched hand to decrease the priority threshold and increase the level of detail in the map display in an intuitive manner”).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to utilize the teachings as in Ren with the teachings as in Duguid. The motivation for doing so would ensure the system to have the ability to use the system and method for context dependent level of detail adjustment for navigation maps and systems disclosed in Ren to identify input commands that correspond to predetermined movement gestures in the data that the gesture recognition sensors record in the vehicle and to reduce or increase the level of detail in the map display in an intuitive manner thus comprising at least two levels of detail of at least one image element obtained from at least one of a sensor module in order to adjust level of detail of image element so that selectable level of details of image element can be displayed.
Regarding claim 2, the combination teachings of Duguid and Ren as discussed above also disclose the method as claimed in claim 1, wherein the at least one image element is part of a data subset obtained from at least one of a data memory, the sensor module or by remote data transmission (see Ren, paragraph [0028]: “The map feature data cache 118 includes data corresponding to one or more map features that are retrieved from the map features database 160. In some embodiments, the memory 116 stores a base map of a geographic region and receives additional map features from the map feature database 160”).
The motivation for combining the references has been discussed in claim 1 above.
Regarding claim 3, the combination teachings of Duguid and Ren as discussed above also disclose the method as claimed in claim 2, wherein the at least one image element in at least one of the at least two levels of detail is abstracted to form a symbol representation (see Ren, paragraph [0037]: “the graphics data include a 2D picture or graphical icon corresponding to the map feature. As described below, in some embodiments a map feature can be depicted using both 2D and 3D graphical representations based on the priority of the feature and the selected priority level threshold for display of the map”).
The motivation for combining the references has been discussed in claim 1 above.
Regarding claim 4, the combination teachings of Duguid and Ren as discussed above also disclose the method as claimed in claim 3, wherein at least one of the at least two levels of detail is at least partially superimposed on at least one other of the at least two levels of detail (see Ren, paragraph [0039]: “the processor 108 adjusts the opacity of the 3D models of map features with priority levels that are below the predetermined threshold to generate the map view with terrain features and higher-priority map features being at least partially visible through the lower-priority map feature models”).
The motivation for combining the references has been discussed in claim 1 above.
Regarding claim 5, the combination teachings of Duguid and Ren as discussed above also disclose the method as claimed in claim 1 wherein the at least two levels of detail are incremented in a predefined manner (see Ren, paragraph [0041]: “the processor 108 modifies the display of each of the map feature in response to the priority level associated with the map feature and the adjusted priority threshold. Some map features may be displayed in the same manner after the priority threshold is adjusted, while other map features are displayed with greater detail or lesser detail in response to a decrease or increase, respectively, in the priority threshold”).
The motivation for combining the references has been discussed in claim 1 above.
Regarding claim 6, the combination teachings of Duguid and Ren as discussed above also disclose the method as claimed in claim 1 wherein at least one of objects, object groups or routes or trajectories of the objects or object groups captured by the sensor module are provided in at least one of the at least two levels of detail as a single or combined image element (see Duguid, paragraph [0062]: “Registration may similarly be performed through a combination of calibration-based and feature-based methods to project images into a consistent coordinate system. This may be used to combine the data from imaging systems that operate in different wavelengths (e.g., IR and visible wavelength) into a coherent dataset. Stitched and registered image data may be projected onto any number of projections, such as equirectangular or cubemap projections”).
The motivation for combining the references has been discussed in claim 1 above.
Claim 8 is rejected for the same reasons as discussed in claim 1 above. In addition, the combination teachings of Duguid and Ren as discussed above also disclose a non-transitory computer-readable data carrier on which a control program is stored, the computer program comprising instructions which, when the control program is executed by an image processing unit, cause the image processing unit to carry out the method according to claim 1 (see Ren, paragraph [0027]: “During operation, the CPU 110 and GPU 112 execute stored programmed instructions 120 that are retrieved from the memory 116. In one embodiment, the stored programmed instructions 120 include operating system software and one or more software application programs, including a mapping and navigation application program. The processor 108 executes the mapping and navigation program and generates 2D and 3D graphical output corresponding to maps and map features through the display device”).
The motivation for combining the references has been discussed in claim 1 above.
Claim 9 is rejected for the same reasons as discussed in claim 1 above. In addition, the combination teachings of Duguid and Ren as discussed above also disclose an image processing unit for an apparatus, wherein the image processing unit is configured to carry out the method as claimed in claim 1 (see Duguid, paragraph [0062]: “video streams from onboard cameras may be combined such that the resulting field of view is greater than that of a single camera. For instance, the video streams transmitted to the RCS may be used to construct a 720-degree surround image to a pilot without any occlusions”).
Regarding claim 10, the combination teachings of Duguid and Ren as discussed above also disclose an apparatus comprising an image processing unit as claimed in claim 9 (see Duguid, paragraph [0062]: “Processing of Real-time Inputs: Video Stitching and Registration. For multi-camera systems, the video streams may require stitching and registration, which is performed by the Onboard Preprocessing Computer”).
The motivation for combining the references has been discussed in claim 1 above.
Regarding claim 11, the combination teachings of Duguid and Ren as discussed above also disclose the apparatus according to claim 10, wherein the apparatus is an aircraft (see Duguid, paragraph [0053]: “FIG. 3 shows examples of aircraft controlled by the methods and systems herein”).
The motivation for combining the references has been discussed in claim 1 above.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to NIENRU YANG whose telephone number is (571)272-4212. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 10AM-6PM EST.
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NIENRU YANG
Examiner
Art Unit 2484
/NIENRU YANG/Examiner, Art Unit 2484
/THAI Q TRAN/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2484
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