Informal and Formals - Patent Drawings

Candidates interested in pursuing Patent Drawing Illustration as their career, when looking out for Patent Drawings samples, they always get the chance to see the finalized drawings published in the patents and industrial design patents. Also, while interviewing the candidates, due to confidentiality issues, it is not possible to show them the inputs provided by the clients. So, when they started working on the live projects, they found it really difficult to understand the invention. So, today I want to show some of my published patents. What was the input and how did the final drawing look like? First, let me tell you about Informal and Formals. In Patent Drawings, the input received from the client (patent agent, patent attorney, inventor or law firms) in the form of images, photographs, hand sketches, written notes or descriptions is termed as 'Informals'. The finalized drawings, which are used in the patent application during filing and which are created using those 'Informals' with planning and creativity within the guidelines of the patent office are termed as 'Formals'.

Every invention is innovative and unique in nature. So, every drawing needs special creativity to convert it from Informal to Formal. One should understand the overall invention to get the final output. It is not like just tracing the photograph received.

Here, I want to cite an example from the published granted patent US10380467B2 - Systems and methods for transit industry vehicle rider accessory capacity monitoring: Fig. 2A

US10380467B2 - Informal - Fig. 2A

US10380467B2 - Formal - Fig. 2A

You can see from both the pictures that there are many things visible in the informal photograph provided. However, the formal does have those features and the parts. Because these are not part of the invention, they should not be added to the drawings.

Also, you can see the way of writing the reference numbers and figure numbers (view numbers).

Let's see one more example from the same patent: Fig. 1

US10380467B2 - Informal - Fig. 1

US10380467B2 - Formal - Fig. 1

You can see the scale and text of the 'directional block diagram'. Also, can see the uniform thickness of the lines used.

Let's have one more example from a published granted patent 'US10306580B1' - Single registration mode support for interworking between 5GC and EPC - Fig. 7

US10306580B1 - Informal - Fig. 7

US10306580B1 - Formal - Fig. 7

From the formal drawing, it can be seen that the text sizes, reference numbers placement and sizes are very important in patent drawings. The line quality should not be blurry and the drawing should be scaled up properly to show all the text and content of the block diagram.

Here is one more example from the published granted patent - 'US11084010B2' - Temperature conditioned two component mixer manifold - Fig. 4

US11084010B2 - Informal - Fig. 4

US11084010B2 - Formal - Fig. 4

I believe it is now clear that the informal received and the formals created are quite different in nature. I will share more such types of drawings once the patents are granted and published in the public domain.

So, if you want to learn more about patent drawings, there is an upcoming "Online Patent Drawing Training" Program. The registration will start on January 03, 2022, and the training will start on January 06, 2022. For more details please visit: https://www.desillus.com/training

Any Law Firm that wants to train their patent illustrators may enrol their employees on the training program. For enquiry please email at info@desillus.com