Ex Parte Demos

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Jun 6, 2016

13197248 (P.T.A.B. Jun. 6, 2016)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE
13/197,248 08/03/2011
26171 7590 06/08/2016
FISH & RICHARDSON P,C (DC)
P.O. BOX 1022
MINNEAPOLIS, MN 55440-1022
FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
Gary A. Demos
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
ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
07314-0013006 5393
EXAMINER
LEE, YYOUNG
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2485
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
06/08/2016 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):
P ATDOCTC@fr.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte GARY A. DEMOS
Appeal2014-009125
Application 13/197,248
Technology Center 2400
Before JOHN P. PINKERTON, NATHAN A. ENGELS, and
NORMAN H. BEAMER, Administrative Patent Judges.
PINKERTON, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellant1 appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner's Final
Rejection of claims 1-11, which constitute all the claims pending in this
application. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We reverse.
1 Appellant identifies the real party in interest as Dolby Laboratories
Licensing Corp. App. Br. 1.
Appeal2014-009125
Application 13/197,248
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Introduction
Appellant's disclosed and claimed invention is generally directed to
improving compressed image chroma information in MPEG-like video
compression systems. Spec. ,-r 2.2
Claim 1 is illustrative and reproduced below:
1. A method for coding a color space representation of video
macroblocks in a computerized video system having at least a
decoder, the method comprising:
receiving, at a decoder from an encoder, a coded bitstream
including a luminance quantization parameter, a first chroma
bias value and a second chroma bias value for a macroblock,
wherein the first chroma bias value and the second chroma bias
value differ from each other for the macroblock, and
constructing, with the decoder, first and second
chrominance quantization parameters for the macroblock,
wherein the constructing comprises:
determining the first chrominance quantization
parameter using the first chroma bias value received in the
coded bitstream and the luminance quantization parameter
received in the coded bitstream; and
determining the second chrominance quantization
parameter using the second chroma bias value received in
the coded bitstream and the luminance quantization
parameter received in the coded bitstream; and
2 Our Decision refers to the Final Action mailed Oct. 24, 2013 ("Final
Act."), Appellant's Appeal Brief filed May 23, 2014 ("App. Br."), the
Examiner's Answer mailed June 25, 2014 ("Ans."), Appellant's Reply Brief
filed Aug. 5, 2014 ("Reply Br."), and the original Specification filed Aug. 3,
2011 ("Spec.").
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Application 13/197,248
decompressing the macroblock using the received
luminance quantization parameter and the constructed first and
second chrominance quantization parameters.
Rejections on Appeal
Claims 1-11 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 112, first paragraph, for
failure to comply with the written description requirement.
Claims 1-9 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 102(e) as being
anticipated by Haskell (US 2006/0002467 Al; published Jan. 5, 2006).
Upon cancelation of the new matter, 3 claims 10-11 stand rejected
under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Haskell and applicant's
admitted prior art ("AAP A").
Claims 1-9 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 (a) as being
unpatentable over Haskell and Ribas-Corbera (US 6,535,251 Bl; issued
Mar. 18, 2003).
Claims 10-11 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 (a) as being
unpatentable over Haskell, Ribas-Corbera, and AAP A.
ANALYSIS
The dispositive issues raised by Appellant's briefs are as follows:
1. Is there written description support in the Specification for the
limitation "receiving, at a decoder from an encoder, a coded
3 In connection with the rejection under 35 U.S.C. § 112, first paragraph,
the Examiner finds the "limitation specifying that the bias values are
received from the encoder to the decoder in the coded bitstream is not
described in the specification." Final Act. 2.
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Application 13/197,248
bitstream including ... a first chroma bias value and a second
chroma bias value," as recited in claim 1, and as similarly
recited in claim 3?
2. Does the combination of Haskell and Ribas-Corbera teach or
suggest (a) "receiving, at a decoder from an encoder, a coded
bitstream including a luminance quantization parameter, a first
chroma bias value and a second chroma bias value for a
macroblock," as recited in claim 1, and (b) "receiving, at a
decoder, a first chroma bias value and a second chroma bias
value for a macroblock, wherein the first chroma bias value
and the second chroma bias value differ from each other for the
macroblock," as similarly recited in claim 3?
Issue 1
Pursuant to Appellant's Amendments to the Claims filed September
30, 2013, claim 1 was amended to recite "receiving, at a decoder from an
encoder, a coded bitstream including a luminance quantization parameter, a
first chroma bias value and a second chroma bias value for a macroblock."
See Amendment 2, filed Sept. 30, 2013 (additions are underlined). Claim 3
was amended to recite "receiving, at a decoder, a first chroma bias value and
a second chroma bias value for a macroblock." Id. at 3 (additions are
underlined). In the Final Action, the Examiner rejects claims 1-11 under
§ 112, paragraph 1, for failing to comply with the written description
requirement based on the finding that the added limitation "specifying that
the bias values are received from the encoder to the decoder in the coded
bitstream is not described in the specification." Final Act. 2.
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Application 13/197,248
Appellant argues that paragraphs 2, 3 and 44 of the Specification
disclose the added limitations to claims 1 and 3. See App. Br. 3-5; Reply
Br. 1-3. In the Answer, the Examiner finds that "the term 'bias value' is not
even mentioned in these paragraphs" and that these paragraphs do not
mention receiving any bias values at the decoder. Ans. 6.
We are persuaded by Appellant's arguments that the Examiner has
erred. In particular, we agree with Appellant's argument that paragraph 3 of
the Specification refers to the MPEG-2 video compression standards that
describe decoding "the coded bitstream" and expressly states "[a]n MPEG
decoder must be able to parse and decode an incoming data stream."
App. Br. 4. We also agree with Appellant that paragraph 44 of the
Specification states "[i]t is necessary to signal the U and V bias values from
the encoder to the decoder unless a pre-arranged value is used," where the
bias value can be specified "for each session, group of pictures (GOP),
frame, or image region." Id. Thus, we agree with Appellant's argument
that a person of ordinary skill in the art, upon reading Appellant's
Specification as originally filed, would understand that Appellant was in
possession of the added limitations of claims 1 and 3 as of the filing date of
the application. See Ariad Pharms., Inc. v. Eli Lilly & Co., 598 F.3d 1336,
1351 (Fed. Cir. 2010) (en bane) ("In other words, the test for sufficiency [to
meet the written description requirement] is whether the disclosure of the
application relied upon reasonably conveys to those skilled in the art that the
inventor had possession of the claimed subject matter as of the filing date.")
(internal citations omitted).
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Application 13/197,248
Accordingly, we do not sustain the Examiner's rejection of claims 1-
11 under§ 112, first paragraph, for failure to comply with the written
description requirement.
Issue 2
Regarding the limitation "macroblock" in claims 1 and 3, the
Examiner finds that, since the claims do not specify the size of a macroblock
to be an array of 16 pixels x 16 pixels, consistent with Appellant's disclosure
and paragraph 12 of Haskell, the broadest reasonable interpretation of
"macroblock may just be a large block," such as an 8 x 8 macroblock. Ans.
6-7, 9-10. The Examiner further finds, "under this interpretation, Haskell et
al discloses receiving at the decoder 240 a first Qp [quantization parameter]
value for a first 8 x 8 macroblock and three different update bias Qp values
for the other three 8 x 8 macroblocks in order to decode a single 16 x 16
macro block." Id. (citing Haskell i-f 42). The Examiner also finds "Ribas-
Corbera teaches reporting an update Qp step size from the encoder to the
decoder" and "[u]nder this interpretation, Ribas-Corbera teaches receiving at
the decoder a first Qp value for a first 8 x 8 macroblock and update bias Qp
step sizes for decoding the other three 8 x 8 image blocks within a single 16
x 16 macroblock." Id. at 10.
Appellant argues the Examiner's interpretation of the term
"macroblock" is in error because a macroblock is a "basic processing unit in
video or image compression systems"-a region of image pixels having a
particular size, such as a 16 x 16 block of pixels in MPEG-2-and although
a macro block may be composed of smaller blocks of pixels, it "is not itself
composed of other macroblocks." Reply Br. 3--4. Appellant also argues
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"whereas the decoder of Haskell receives at most a single Qp value for a
macroblock, claims 1 and 3 recite a method in which a decoder receives
three values for a given macroblock: (i) 'a luminance quantization
parameter;' (ii) 'a first chroma bias value;' and (iii) 'a second chroma bias
value."' App. Br. 6. Regarding the Examiner's finding at page 4 of the
Final Action that Haskell discloses "scaling the Qp value differently for the
luminance and chrominance channels" and, therefore, "up to three different
values for the luminance and chrominance channels may be signaled from
the encoder to the decoder," Appellant states:
But this statement misses the point. As illustrated in FIG. 3 of
Haskell, the only quantization parameter signals in Haskell that
are transmitted from the encoder to the decoder are the Qp value
and updates to the Qp value. (Haskell, i-fi-1 [0014], [0042]). The
Qp update signal in Haskell is sent to "change a value of Qp as
frequently as every macro block." (Haskell, i1 [0042]). This Qp
update signal is then used to update Qp, and the updated Qp is
subsequently used to look-up three scalers, namely, a DC LUM
scaler, an 1A .. C CHROl\1 scaler, and a DC CHROl\1 scaler.
(Haskell, FIG. 3, i-fi-1 [0026], [0039], Tables 1, 2, 3). The
relationship between the received Qp value and the generated
scalers would therefore always be fixed. In other words, for a
given value of Qp, there would be a predetermined set of values
for the DC LUM scaler, AC CHROM scaler, and DC CHROM
scaler.
App. Br. 6.
Regarding Ribas-Corbera, Appellant argues the cited portion of
Ribas-Corbera merely discloses "'that the value of the [quantization] step
size is often modified at each image block of a frame,' and does not provide
any support for the examiner's hypothetical definition of a macro block."
Reply Br. 8 (citing Ribas-Corbera 2:21-22.).
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We are persuaded by Appellant's arguments that the Examiner has
erred in rejecting claims 1 and 3. Even if we were to agree with the
Examiner's interpretation of a macro block, we agree with Appellant the
Examiner has not shown that Haskell or the combination of Haskell and
Ribas-Corbera teaches or suggests receiving at a decoder "a luminance
quantization parameter, a first chroma bias value and a second chroma bias
value for a macroblock." App. Br. 6; Reply Br. 4--5. That is, even if the
Examiner is correct that Haskell discloses receiving at a decoder a first Qp
value for a first 8 x 8 macroblock and three different Qp values for three
other 8 x 8 macroblocks, the Examiner has not shown Haskell teaches or
suggests receiving at a decoder "a luminance quantization parameter, a first
chroma bias value and a second chroma bias value" for any of such
macroblocks. In particular, regarding Haskell, we agree with Appellant that
even if paragraph [0041] of Haskell discloses a processor that
computes scaler values according to the Qp value, Haskell still
does not disclose or suggest receiving "a luminance quantization
parameter, a first chroma bias value and a second chroma bias
value," as recited in claims 1 and 3 because the only quantization
parameter signals in Haskell that are transmitted from the
encoder to the decoder are the Qp value and updates to the Qp
value. (Haskell, iTiT [0014], [0042]).
Reply Br. 5.
For the reasons argued by Appellant, we also agree with Appellant
that "Ribas-Corbera does not remedy this deficiency of Haskell." See Reply
Br. 7.
Accordingly, we do not sustain the rejection of claims 1 and 3 under
§ 102(e) and§ 103(a), as well as dependent claims 2 and 4--11.
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DECISION
We reverse the Examiner's decision rejecting claims 1-11.
REVERSED
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