Ex Parte Park et al

Patent Trial and Appeal BoardDec 4, 2017

12838957 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 4, 2017)

United States Patent and Trademark Office UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE United States Patent and Trademark Office Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS P.O.Box 1450 Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450 www.uspto.gov APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO. 12/838,957 07/19/2010 Min-Woo PARK Q119873 7306 23373 7590 12/06/2017 SUGHRUE MION, PLLC 2100 PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE, N.W. SUITE 800 WASHINGTON, DC 20037 EXAMINER XU, XIAOLAN ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2488 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 12/06/2017 ELECTRONIC Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding. The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication. Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the following e-mail address(es): PPROCESSING@SUGHRUE.COM sughrue@sughrue.com USPTO@sughrue.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte MIN-WOO PARK, DAE-SUNG CHO, and WOONG-IL CHOI Appeal 2016-002697 Application 12/838,957 Technology Center 2400 Before MAHSHID D. SAADAT, CARL L. SILVERMAN, and SCOTT E. BAIN, Administrative Patent Judges. SAADAT, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appellants1 appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s Final Rejection of claims 1, 4—12, 15—20, 23—28, and 31—38. Claims 2, 3, 13, 14, 21, 22, 29, and 30 were cancelled. We have jurisdiction over the pending claims under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We affirm. 1 According to Appellants, the real party in interest is Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. (Br. 2). Appeal 2016-002697 Application 12/838,957 STATEMENT OF THE CASE Appellants’ invention relates to a method and apparatus for coding and decoding multi-view video sequences (Spec. 12). Exemplary claim 1 under appeal reads as follows: 1. A multi-view video coding method for providing a multi view video service, the multi-view video coding method comprising: coding a base layer picture using an arbitrary video codec; generating a prediction picture using a reconstructed base layer picture, which is reconstructed from the coded base layer picture, and a reconstructed layer picture corresponding to a view different from a view of the base layer picture; and residual-coding a layer picture corresponding to the different view using the generated prediction picture, wherein the reconstructed base layer picture is a currently reconstructed base layer picture, and the reconstructed layer picture used for generation of the prediction picture is a previously reconstructed layer picture generated by adding a previous residual picture to a previous prediction picture. REFERENCES and REJECTIONS Claims 1, 4—12, 15—20, 23—28, and 31—38 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) as anticipated by Park et al. (WO 2008/051041 Al; published May 2, 2008) (“Park”) (see Final Act. 5—11). ANALYSIS We have reviewed the Examiner’s rejections in light of Appellants’ arguments in Appellants’ Appeal Brief that the Examiner has erred. We are unpersuaded by Appellants’ contentions and concur with the findings and conclusions reached by the Examiner as explained below. 2 Appeal 2016-002697 Application 12/838,957 Independent Claims 1, 12, 20, 28, and 38 Appellants contend Park fails to disclose “the reconstructed layer picture used for generation of the prediction picture is a previously reconstructed layer picture generated by adding a previous residual picture to a previous prediction picture,” as recited in claim 1, and similarly recited in claims 12, 20, 28, and 38 (see Br. 14, 17). More specifically, Appellants argue Park merely discloses performing scalable video coding via generating a Plo picture from an Ilo picture, but Park does not provide any disclosure regarding either a prediction picture of the Plo picture or a residual picture between the Plo picture and a prediction picture of the Plo picture (see Br. 15). As further argued by Appellants, Park discloses a scalability video encoder performs scalable video coding with reference to only one adjacent picture in the scalable coding apparatus whereas, claim 1 recites that a previously reconstructed layer picture is generated by using two pictures (see Br. 16). We are not persuaded by Appellants’ contention. The Examiner cited Figure 9 of Park as disclosing the aforementioned limitation of claim 1 (see Final Act. 6—7). An annotated version of Figure 9 of Park is reproduced below: 3 Appeal 2016-002697 Application 12/838,957 Sas:« layer MLS) PIG, 9 Tiise Figure 9 of Park depicts a reference structure for a basic video (i.e., video 91) and adjacent videos (i.e., videos 92 and 93) (see Park 9:18—20). The Examiner found that Park’s basic layer 0 (“L0”) unit 92 first picture Plo (annotated in the reproduced version of Fig. 9 as “(C)”) teaches the claimed “previously reconstructed layer picture,” because Park teaches: a) picture Plo is generated based on basic layer 0 (“L0”) unit 91 first picture Ilo (annotated in the reproduced version of Figure 9 as “(A)”) using an inter-prediction technique of motion 4 Appeal 2016-002697 Application 12/838,957 compensation, where picture Ilo is used to predict picture Plo; b) picture Plo is used to generate basic layer 0 (“L0”) unit 92 second picture Blo (annotated in the reproduced version of Figure 9 as “(B)”), where picture Plo is used to predict picture Blo; c) picture Plo, which was previously inter-predicted using Ilo, is first reconstructed before being used as a reference picture for prediction and generation of Blo; and d) picture Plo is previous to picture BLo with respect to the time axis in Figure 9 (see Ans. 10-11; see also Final Act. 5—7). As further found by the Examiner, the reconstruction of a reference picture (i.e., picture Plo) that is generated using an inter-prediction technique necessarily involves reversing the inter-prediction technique that generates the reference picture (i.e., picture Plo) (see Ans. 10-11). In other words, the inter-prediction technique involves subtracting a prediction picture (i.e., picture Ilo) from the reference picture (i.e., picture Plo) and results in a residual picture that is a coded representation of the reference picture (i.e., residual image of picture Plo). As such, the reconstruction of the reference picture (i.e., picture Ilo) involves adding back the previous prediction picture (i.e., picture Ilo) to the residual picture (i.e., residual image of picture Plo) and results in the reconstruction of the original reference picture (i.e., picture Plo). Appellants’ argument fails to persuasively show error in the Examiner’s analysis. We therefore agree with the Examiner’s finding that the teachings of Park imply “the reconstructed layer picture used for generation of the prediction picture” must be “a previously reconstructed 5 Appeal 2016-002697 Application 12/838,957 layer picture generated by adding a previous residual picture to a previous prediction picture,” as recited in claim 1, and similarly recited in claims 12, 20, 28, and 38. Based on the discussion above, we agree with the Examiner that Park teaches all the elements of claims 1,12, 20, 28, and 38. Accordingly, we sustain the rejection of claims 1, 12, 20, 28, and 38 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b). Remaining Claims No separate arguments are presented for the remaining dependent claims (see Br. 17). We therefore sustain their rejections for the reasons stated with respect to independent claims 1, 12, 20, 28, and 38. DECISION We affirm the Examiner’s rejection of claims 1, 4—12, 15—20, 23—28, and 31-38 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b). No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(l)(iv). AFFIRMED 6