Appeal No. 2002-0386
Application No. 08/553,281
While we find that the examiner has set forth what appears at first blush to be a
prima facie case of obviousness of the claimed invention and addressed all of
appellants’ arguments, we find that the examiner has not directly addressed one of
appellants’ arguments. From our review of the examiner’s answer, we agree with the
examiner and find that appellants have not provided specific argument(s) that there is
not sufficient motivation to combine the teachings of the four and five references in
combination. Therefore, this general argument is not persuasive.
With respect to substantive arguments to the specific language of independent
claims 1 and 11, appellants argue that the combination of references does not teach all
of the limitations and in particular “means/step for transmitting the compressed image
signal including the input image and the further image signal superimposed thereon” in
claims 1 and 11. (See brief at page 6.) From our review of the claimed invention, we
do not find this specific language in either of the claims. While there are steps of
“forming a compressed image . . .” and “transmitting the compressed image . . .” in
claim 1 and “superimposing means . . .” and “transmitting means . . .” in claim 11, we do
not find express support for the argued limitation. Nor do we find that the examiner has
either identified this deficiency or addressed this relevant portion of the compressing
and transmitting elements of the claims.
From our review of the claimed invention, we find that a second image data must
be superimposed or combined within the input image and then the combination of the
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