Appeal No. 98-1287
Application 08/359,706
DECISION ON APPEAL
This is a decision on the appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134 from the examiner’s final rejection of
claims 1-10, which constitute all the claims remaining in the application.
We reverse.
BACKGROUND
Appellants’ invention relates to survey instruments. Appellants disclose a mechanism for
aligning the optical axis of a telescope in a survey instrument with the center of a target. In the disclosed
embodiment, appellants provide light from an emitter that is transmitted to a target prism, and reflected
back from the target to an image sensor.
Claims 1-10 are present, with Claims 1 and 2 being independent. Appellants’ Claim 1 is
illustrative.
1. A survey instrument, comprising a solid state image sensor, a telescope for receiving light
from a target, said telescope having an optical axis along which said light travels toward said sensor, an
emitter for emitting flash light toward said target, said emitter being in an on condition during each said
flash and in an off condition between said flashes, and a survey controller for calculating the difference
of image signals from the solid state image sensor between while said emitter is in on condition and
while in off condition, whereby the center position of the image of the target on the solid state image
sensor is detected, based on the position of the image of the emitter.
The examiner relies on the following references:
Wells et al. (Wells) 4,717,251 Jan. 5, 1988
Shoemaker 4,968,147 Nov. 6, 1990
Wiklund 5,051,934 Sep. 24, 1991
2
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