Appeal No. 1997-1655
Application 07/797,893
process" (Robb, page 221, column 2), which we find occurs after the expansion or extraction process.
In contrast, appellants’ invention recited in claim 13 operates in a realtime manner to display data during
the expansion process.
The examiner asserts in the Answer (page 8) that it would have been obvious to display the
extracted data as soon as it is determined (simultaneously or during the expansion substep) in order to
allow the operator to see some of the results without having to wait for all of the data to be processed.
We note that judgements on obviousness are in a sense necessarily a reconstruction based upon
hindsight reasoning. But so long as it takes into account only knowledge which was
within the level of ordinary skill at the time the claimed invention was made, and does not include
knowledge gleaned only from the applicants’ disclosure, such a reconstruction is proper. See In re
McLaughlin, 443 F.2d 1392, 170 USPQ 209 (CCPA 1971). We find that the reasoning of the
obviousness rejection in the rejection took into account knowledge gleaned only from appellants’
disclosure. Specifically, one would have to look to appellants’ disclosure for direction to display and/or
edit extracted image data in a realtime manner during the expansion substep. As stated by appellants at
page 12 of their specification, this allows the extraction process to be more efficiently and accurately
performed, as well as allowing the display to be "immediately reflected to the 3D perspective projection
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