133 F.2d 778 | 2d Cir. | 1943
The defendant appeals from the usual judgment of injunction and for an accounting, in an action for the infringement of patent No. 1,982,406, issued on November 27, 1934 to Hans F. Tonnies. Infringement being conceded, the sole question that we shall consider is the validity of the claims. The patent is for “an exposure meter which directly indicates the time of exposure necessary for taking photographs” (page one, lines 5, 6). It operates by means of a “photo-electric cell,” which, when struck by rays of light, .generates a current of electricity whose strength depends upon the brightness of the light. A galvanometer set in the circuit measures the strength of this'current and thus of the brightness of the entering light; the deflection of the galvanometer
Independently of this evidence it appears from the testimony that such a cell had not been developed earlier which could generate a “current sufficiently large to actuate an indicating instrument.” Fritts, the original inventor of the cell, had indeed in 1885 disclosed one that would generate “a very little current,” but its measurement “required a sensitive galvanometer” which “would not be portable,” but “would be a laboratory type of instrument”; indeed, “it was purely a laboratory device.” The plaintiff is an old and skilled manufacturer of electrical instruments; “competitive with many of the best makers of Europe.” It believes itself to “lead the trade in this respect and” to “have contributed most of the advances that have come in this trade, and the fundamental theories involved therein.” It “is founded on research and was one of the pioneers in industrial research in the entire electrical industry.” Nevertheless, although Goodwin, its engineer, had for a number of years been interested in getting an accurate meter for sunlight to control the exposure of a photographic plate, it was not until 1931 that the path was cleared, “when our company brought out, developed a photo-electrical cell that was the means that I was looking for. And we proceeded immediately to develop an exposure meter.” A compact, portable exposure meter had been awaiting a “photo-electric cell” of the self-generating type, which did not operate as a variable resistance in a battery circuit; and such a cell did not appear commercially much before 1929, else the plaintiff would have known of it.
The claims in suit were not however directed to that part of the disclosure; there was another difficulty which had to be overcome before such a meter could be made, and the patent depends for its validity upon the way that Tonnies overcame it. The “acceptance angle” of a camera means the greatest angle between any of the rays which enter the lens and fall upon the plate. Obviously, no rays can be photographed which do not reach the plate, so that the brightness of the scene for the photographic purposes means the light which is within the “acceptance angle.” A proper exposure meter should register only such rays as fall upon the plate, and the most obvious way to make one would be to duplicate the camera, merely substituting a “photo-electric cell” for the photographic plate. That is exactly what Adsit disclosed in Figures 1 and 2, though, apparently realizing that this was a clumsy device, he also disclosed in Figures 3 and 4 the much smaller boxlike motor we have mentioned, whose “acceptance angle” was to be the same as that of the camera. That meter would have anticipated Tonnies if the cell had been self-generating and there had been “a plurality” of admission chambers instead of one.
The patent in suit did “pluralize” the admission chambers, making a kind of honeycomb structure at the open end of the meter; each chamber being so proportioned in width and depth that its “acceptance angle” should correspond with that.
We do not know by what steps he came by this contrivance; but we do know how Goodwin independently did so in February, 1932, before the plaintiff had yet learned of the Tonnies patent. It had perfected the cell in 1931, as we have.said, but its engineers did not think of cutting up its surface and of using shallow chambers. Instead they set a tube at the open end, which, as its inner opening included the whole surface, had to be much too long for a pocket meter. They succeeded in producing only a bulky, awkward machine, even after they had made the tube telescope, so that it could be pushed in when not in use. The meter so designed they showed to a convention of motion-picture engineers in October of 1931, among whom was one, White, then in charge of the photographic laboratories of the Du Pont Company in Parlin, New Jersey. He saw the meter and “was playing with” it “a great deal of the time as well as were a number of other engineers.” But nobody suggested any substitute for the tube, and the plaintiff’s engineers were balked until one of them suggested taking the meter to White and getting his advice. This they did in January, 1932, and White— apparently at once — “suggested that we use a honeycomb baffle,” which completed the meter in the form in which it has been put upon the market.
In the light of this history the plaintiff makes the customary argument that what had halted such experts as the plaintiff’s engineers, judges ought not dismiss as obvious. To this we think however that the defendant’s answer is a good one: the plaintiff’s engineers did not know the optical art, and as soon as the problem was put to someone who did, the answer was immediate. The art had already several 'times provided tubes to shut out all but direct rays from impinging upon a “photoelectric cell.” Adsit (supra); Weiss, No. 321,069 (1885); McQuillen, No. 1,351,182 (1920); Bergstein, No. 1,840,014 (application filed 1928). And indeed, although the plaintiff’s engineers did not know of these disclosures, they had got so far independently. But the optical art had gone farther; it had used a “honeycomb” screen or “baffle” several times. As a means of centering the rays of an automobile headlight it was disclosed in Harrison, No. 1,136,006 (1915); Martin, No. 1,141,718 (1915); Bone, No. 1,280,953 (1918); Fuligni & Muhsgnug, No. 1,336,951 (1920). (Walker, No. 1,246,509 (1917) applied the same device to light shades.) All these were indeed to control emitted rays, but Otte, No. 1,266,525 (1918) applied such a “baffle” to restrict the admission of entrant light rays; and so did Bucky, No. 1,164,987 (1915) to entrant Rontgen rays. With this knowledge it does not seem to us that it was difficult to see that to reduce the length of the admission chamber, one needed only to multiply the chambers; and, this is confirmed by the fact that apparently as soon as someone familiar with the optical art was seriously consulted, he at once adopted that method.
As we have very often said, we put more reliance in deciding the issue of invention upon the history of the art than upon any tests which can _ be stated in general terms; indeed, there are, we think, none such which perceptibly help to a solution. H. C. White Co. v. Morton E. Converse & Son Co., 2 Cir., 20 F.2d 311, 313; R. Hoe & Co. v. Goss Printing Press Co., 2 Cir., 30 F.2d 271, 274; E. I. DuPont de Nemours & Co. v. Glidden Co., 2 Cir., 67 F.2d 392, 395; Picard v. United Aircraft Corp., 2 Cir., 128 F.2d 632, 636. In every case the issue is whether a per
Judgment reversed; complaint dismissed.