Does Image-Based Prior Art Analysis Really Save Time & Efforts? Report

First, let us take a small trip around prior art searches and the importance of image based prior art analysis.

A prior art search is performed in order to find hidden/unseen prior arts which can be used as an evidence against a patent to order to invalidate it.

Now a question which bugs the most of us is what can be given as a valid prior art while conducting invalidation/validity search?

A prior art is a manifestation that the invention was known prior to the filing of the target patent. It can be anything known in books, journals, published papers, blogs, oral descriptions, public exhibition and much more.

In order to find relevant prior art, sometimes it gets really tedious to imagine all the ways in which an invention can be expressed. Every person has a different way of thinking and tends to express his/her ideas in different ways.

While everyone is busy in digging prior arts through traditional ways why not take the road less traveled and go unconventional?

Most of us seek to get information to unearth a valid prior art in text form, ignoring the fact that only images can be used as valid prior art if it is clearly showing the claimed invention.