Appeal No. 2005-2619
Application No. 09/734,826
components together as a unit. (Answer at page 6). Therefore, we agree with the
examiner that the combination of Uehara, Shirai and Schaffrina would have taught the
invention as recited in independent claim 1 and that the three teachings are reasonably
related so that it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of
the invention to have combined the relevant teachings. Therefore, we find that the
examiner has established a prima facie case of obviousness of independent claim 1.
We therefore look to appellant’s responsive arguments to either rebut or show
error in the prima facie case of obviousness. Appellant argues that the Uehara does
not teach the adjustment of the picture recording means so that the recorded body area
lies within the nominal range. (Brief at page 5). We agree with appellant that each of
the individual teachings does not teach the claimed invention, but find that the
combination of Uehara, Shirai and Schaffrina would have suggested that the recording
means move to within a range as identified by Uehara for the microphone adjustment as
modified by the servo-driven adjustment of Shirai to replace the servo-mechanism of
Uehara with the combined housing of the audio and visual components of Schaffrina.
(Answer at pages 10-11). Therefore, we find that the combined teachings of Uehara,
Shirai and Schaffrina would have taught and fairly suggested the invention recited in
independent claim 1.
Appellant argues that if Uehara detects a person’s mouth and always moves the
camera to the center of the detected mouth, there is no disclosure of a nominal range or
7
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007