Michael Zaletel

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Oct 26, 2021

2020003618 (P.T.A.B. Oct. 26, 2021)

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.
15/599,621 05/19/2017 Michael Edward Zaletel I4S-003-US-CON 6258
36563 7590 10/26/2021
BELLES KATZ LLC
1800 John F. Kennedy Blvd.
Suite 1010
Philadelphia, PA 19103
EXAMINER
NAZAR, AHAMED I
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2178
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
10/26/2021 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):
uspto@thebellesgroup.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte MICHAEL EDWARD ZALETEL
Appeal 2020-003618
Application 15/599,621
Technology Center 2100
Before MAHSHID D. SAADAT, ALLEN R. MacDONALD, and
NABEEL U. KHAN, Administrative Patent Judges.
SAADAT, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 134(a), Appellant1 appeals from the
Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1–9, 11–14, and 18–22.2 We have
jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.

1 We use the word Appellant to refer to “applicant” as defined in 37 C.F.R.
§ 1.42(a). Appellant identifies the real party in interest as the inventor of the
application, Michael Edward Zaletel. Appeal Br. 2.
2 Claims 15–17 were previously cancelled. As further explained in more
detail, the rejection of claims 10, 23, and 24 was withdrawn. See Ans. 3.
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CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER
The claims are directed to a method for recording media clips such as
camera views positioned at various different locations throughout the world
onto an electronic device. Spec. ¶ 23. Claim 1, reproduced below,
illustrates the claimed subject matter:
1. A method of creating a video composition comprising:
a) displaying, in a first display device of a first electronic
device, a plurality of thumbnails, each thumbnail comprising a
video stream that corresponds to a camera view perceived by a
camera lens of the first electronic device or a remote camera view
perceived by a remote camera lens of a remote electronic device;
b) selecting one or more of the plurality of thumbnails to
form selected thumbnails;
c) activating one or more of the selected thumbnails to
form activated thumbnails;
d) pressing a record button to initiate a recording session;
e) switching which of the selected thumbnails are the
activated thumbnails at various times during the recording
session;
f) pressing an end record button to end the recording
session, the recording session having a duration;
g) storing, on a first memory device of the first electronic
device: (1) a plurality of extended video clips, each of the
extended video clips corresponding to the video stream of one of
the selected thumbnails during the recording session, each of the
extended video clips having a duration that is equal to the
duration of the recording session, and each of the extended video
clips being saved on the first memory device as a separate file;
and (2) a video composition comprising video clip segments
corresponding to the video streams of the activated thumbnails,
the video composition having a duration that is equal to the
duration of the recording session;
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h) displaying graphical representations of each of the
extended video clips on the first display device of the first
electronic device;
i) simultaneously replaying at least a portion of each of the
extended video clips in the graphical representations from a user-
defined starting point; and
j) selectively activating and deactivating the graphical
representations of the extended video clips during the portion of
the extended video clips that is replayed in step i) to edit at least
a portion of the video composition.
Appeal Br. 23 (emphasis added).
REFERENCES
The prior art relied upon by the Examiner is:
Name Reference Date
Bratton et al.
(“Bratton”)
US 2010/0304731 A1 Dec. 2, 2010
Diaz et al. (“Diaz) US 2012/0120186 A1 May 17, 2012
Hilla. US 9,369,635 B1 June 14, 2016
Denystkalich, An In Depth Review of CollabraCam: An iPhone/iPad
App for Multi-Camera Video Production, March 11, 2011,
http://thenextweb.com/apps/2011/03/11/an-in-depth-review-of-
collabracam-an-iphoneipad-app-for-multi-camera-video-production/
(last accessed Sept. 21, 2012) (“Denystkalich”)
CollabraCam: Live Multicamera Switching on your iPhone or iPad,
January 4, 2012, http://www.fcp.co/hardware-and-
software/consumer/388-collabracam-live-multicamera-switching-on-
your-iphone-or-ipad (last accessed Mar. 21, 2013) (“CollabraCam”)

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REJECTION3
Claims 1–9, 11–14, and 18–22 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as unpatentable over Denystkalich, CollabraCam, Bratton, Hilla,
and Diaz.
OPINION
We have reviewed the Examiner’s rejections in light of Appellant’s
arguments that the Examiner has erred. We disagree with Appellant’s
conclusions. Except as noted herein, we adopt as our own (1) the findings
and reasons set forth by the Examiner in the action from which the appeal is
taken (Final Act. 3–26); and (2) the reasons set forth by the Examiner in the
Examiner’s Answer (Ans. 3–11) in response to the Appellant’s Appeal
Brief. We concur with the conclusions reached by the Examiner. We
highlight the following for emphasis.
Appellant’s Contentions
With respect to the obviousness rejection of claim 1, Appellant
contends the Final Office Action does not reflect the correct claim language
of claim 1, arguing that the Final Office Action “lists steps a) through f) that
do not correspond to the language of claim 1.” Appeal Br. 8–9 (emphasis
omitted). Appellant further contends Hilla’s disclosed post-editing process
“is done differently than the process required by steps h) through j) of claim

3 In the Final Office Action, the Examiner also rejected claims 10, 23, and
24 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Denystkalich,
CollabraCam, Bratton, Hilla, and Diaz, and separately rejected claim 24
under 35 U.S.C. § 112, first paragraph as failing to comply with the written
description requirement. See Final Act. 3, 19, 24–26. However, in the
Examiner’s Answer, the Examiner indicated “[r]ejections to dependent
claims 10, 23, and 24 have been withdrawn.” Ans. 3. Thus, the rejections of
claims 10, 23, and 24 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) and 35 U.S.C. § 112, first
paragraph are deemed withdrawn and not before us.
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1.” Id. at 11–12. More specifically, Appellant contends step j) of claim 1
(i.e., “j”) (“selectively activating and deactivating the graphical
representations of the extended video clips during the portion of the
extended video clips that is replayed in step i) to edit at least a portion of the
video composition”) is not disclosed in Hilla or any of the other cited
references. Id. at 12–13 (emphasis omitted).
With respect to the obviousness rejection of claim 7, Appellant
contends none of Denystkalich, CollabraCam, and Hilla discloses using pre-
recorded media files from a database to incorporate into a final media
composition. See Appeal Br. 17. Appellant further contends Bratton does
not cure this deficiency because Bratton merely teaches that encrypted
device information can be saved to and retrieved from a database. See id.
With respect to the obviousness rejection of claim 18, Appellant
contends Bratton teaches modifying a video data stream with regard to its
resolution, frame rate, and compression depending on an end user’s display
size. See Appeal Br. 15–16. As contended by Appellant, Bratton fails to
disclose saving low resolution video clip segments to a mobile phone’s
memory, obtaining high resolution video clip segments that correspond to
the low resolution video clip segments, and replacing the low resolution
video clip segments with the corresponding high resolution video clip
segments. See id. at 16. Appellant proffers a similar contention regarding
the obvious rejection of claim 22. See id. at 19–20.
Analysis
Claim 1
With respect to Appellant’s argument that the Final Office Action
does not reflect the correct claim language of steps a) through f) of claim 1,
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Appellant concedes Hilla discloses steps a) through g) of claim 1. See
Appeal Br. 11 (“Appellant concedes that [Hilla] likely discloses the
limitations set forth in steps a) through g) of claim 1.”). Thus, even
assuming arguendo that Appellant is correct, Appellant does not show
reversible error. Regarding Appellant’s argument that Hilla’s post-editing
process is different than the process required by steps h) through j) of claim
1, Appellant further concedes Hilla does disclose steps h) and i) of claim 1.
See id. at 11–12 (“Step h) of claim 1 . . . could be the clips 382a-d of FIG. 47
or the camera displays 388a-d of FIG. 48 of Hilla. . . . Appellant believes
that Hilla may disclose step i) of claim 1[.]”).
Appellant’s argument that Hilla does not disclose step j) of claim 1 is
not persuasive. Specifically, Appellant argues Hilla discloses that a user
clicks a space between two clips in a video composition and drags to the left
or the right to lengthen one of two video clips and shorten the other video
clip, rather than activate and deactivate the video clips. See Appeal Br. 12.
However, consistent with the Examiner’s findings, Hilla additionally
discloses that the user drags one of the camera displays 388a-b onto a video
clip 390a-d in the Camera Video Timeline 297 when a user decides that a
different camera had a better shot than a camera used in an original edit,
where the original video clip is replaced with the selected new video clip.
See Ans. 4–5; Hilla 32:39–50. As further found by the Examiner, Hilla’s
disclosure teaches or suggests the claimed “selectively activating and
deactivating the graphical representations of the extended video clips,” as
recited in claim 1. See Ans. 4–5. Appellant’s argument does not address the
Examiner’s finding with respect to Hilla. Thus, we agree with the Examiner
that the combination of Denystkalich, CollabraCam, Bratton, Hilla, and Diaz
teaches or suggests the limitations of claim 1.
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Claim 7
Claim 7 recites, inter alia, “a) receiving, on the first electronic device,
a plurality of low resolution media streams of high resolution media clip
files from one or more databases, the high resolution media clip files being
pre-recorded and stored on the one or more databases.” Appeal Br. 24.
Appellant’s argument that Hilla does not disclose this limitation is not
persuasive. We agree with the Examiner’s finding that Hilla discloses a data
store that records video feeds from an active video feed, where the data store
can be a network attached storage device. See Ans. 10–11; Hilla 2:19–21,
4:7–20. We further agree with the Examiner that the recording of video
feeds via the data store teaches the aforementioned limitation of claim 7.
Thus, we agree with the Examiner that the combination of Denystkalich,
CollabraCam, Bratton, Hilla, and Diaz also teaches or suggests the
limitations of claim 7.
Claims 18 and 22
Claim 18 recites “for each low resolution video clip and low
resolution video clip segment recorded in step g), acquiring from the remote
electronic devices a high resolution video clip and a high resolution video
clip segment that corresponds to that low resolution video clip and low
resolution video clip segment,” and “automatically replacing the low
resolution video clips and the low resolution video clip segments in the
video composition recorded on the first memory device of the first electronic
device with the high resolution video clips and the high resolution video clip
segments.” Appeal Br. 26. Claim 22 recites similar limitations. See id. at
28. Appellant’s argument that Bratton does not disclose these limitations is
not persuasive. We agree with the Examiner’s finding that Bratton discloses
a video director application that directs a video source to dynamically
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change its resolution, frame rate, and compression as suitable for a display
size and available bandwidth (i.e., display of a smaller size image on a
mobile device causes the video director application to request transmission
of a reduced resolution video feed, whereas display of a larger size image on
the mobile device causes the video director application to request a higher
resolution video feed). See Ans. 8–9 (citing Bratton ¶¶ 55, 56). Bratton’s
dynamic modification of a video source’s resolution, frame rate, and
compression teaches the aforementioned limitations of claim 18 and similar
limitations of claim 22. Thus, we agree with the Examiner that the
combination of Denystkalich, CollabraCam, Bratton, Hilla, and Diaz also
teaches or suggests the limitations of claims 18 and 22.
CONCLUSION
We affirm the Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1–9, 11–14, and
18–22 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a).
DECISION SUMMARY
In summary:
Claims
Rejected
35 U.S.C.
§
Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed
1–9, 11–
14, 18–22
103(a) Denystkalich,
CollabraCam,
Bratton, Hilla,
Diaz
1–9, 11–14,
18–22

TIME PERIOD FOR RESPONSE
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a). See 37 C.F.R.
§ 1.136(a)(1)(iv).
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AFFIRMED