Appeal No. 95-4539 Page 7
Application No. 08/205,394
separately patentable in accordance with 37 C.F.R. §
1.192(c)(7) and M.P.E.P. § 1206.
Obviousness
In rejecting claims under 35 U.S.C. § 103, the patent
examiner bears the initial burden of establishing a prima
facie case of obviousness. A prima facie case of obviousness
is established when the teachings from the prior art itself
would appear to have suggested the claimed subject matter to a
person
having ordinary skill in the art. If the examiner fails to
establish a prima facie case, an obviousness rejection is
improper and will be overturned. In re Rijckaert, 9 F.3d
1531, 1532, 28 USPQ2d 1955, 1956 (Fed. Cir. 1993). With this
as background, we analyze the prior art applied by the
examiner in rejecting the claims on appeal.
Regarding claim 18, the sole independent claim, the
examiner
observes that Schoolman discloses a stereoscopic imaging
system. The examiner reads the claimed casing, optical, and
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