Appeal No. 2006-0830
Application No. 09/911,954
The claim recites that the method comprises “examining the
color components of a pixel in the image.” As the examiner pointed
out, column 2, lines 14-25, of Sobol indicates that the application
of filtering is a function of intensity of the pixel. Therefore,
it is clear to us that Sobol discloses an examination of the
components of a pixel in the image, as the pixel must be
“examined,” as broadly claimed, in order to determine its intensity
value. Since Sobol also indicates, in column 4, that the method is
applicable to “color,” it is clear that the artisan would have
understood that there is an examination of color components of a
pixel in Sobol.
The claimed method next calls for “selectively applying a
matrix to the color components of the pixel to create an output
color component only when the pixel is not in a dark area of the
image.” Column 2, lines 18-19, of Sobol recites that pixels with
low intensity (i.e., in the dark area), receive little or no
filtering, i.e., a matrix is not applied when the pixel is in a
dark area. Conversely, filtering (a matrix) is applied to the
pixel (to the color components of a pixel when using color) only
when the pixel is not in a dark area of the image, as claimed. As
far as creating an output color component, when the filter (matrix)
is applied in Sobol, clearly, the image resulting from the
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