It’s been a busy summer for me, sorry for not posting the weekly linkfest in, well, a weekly manner. If you want more frequent updates from me, you should follow me on twitter
Change your perspective with MirrorMap – an augmented reality application that lets you tap to near by CCTV cameras. I think they had a similar thing in Rainbows End.
This week’s video comes to us via Etsuji Kameyama’s blog. I often complained about not having the AR equivalent of Angry Birds (ARAB). Well, we are not there yet, but Junaio now features a channel with the boids, enabling users to take picture with them. Even though it’s a wholly new media, still nobody likes the boomerang bird.
Cool augmented dressing room, powered by Kinect, which makes the clothes look a little bit more realistic and less pasted on your body. (via augmented.org)
AR Dodge Ball from TU Munich. Is it a HUD on your face or are you just a weirdo?
This week’s video is without a doubt this one from The Heavy Projects – I never got so many retweets as I did after tweeting about it (if you don’t follow me I’m @augmented). Harnessing the power of Junaio, the billboards of Times Square are repainted with original street art. I think the guys from Artvertiser had this idea first, but it’s pretty neat to see it actually implemented. I just wonder whether it’s ok with Junaio’s terms of use.
A couple of weeks ago Qualcomm held its Uplinq conference. Xconomy has a nice review of Qualcomm’s AR vision and the five application categories it is trying to promote.
Qualcomm’s Jay Wright however thinks that AR glasses are a long way off – both due to technology challenges and adoption issues.
Since Friday was Canada Day, and tomorrow is the 4th of July, let us celebrate with a double feature in this week’s video. Two first person shooter games caught my eye this week, the first ShootAR has a surprisingly sleek teaser video, while the other Uwar seems a little bit more feasible, and features cool shirts (well, cool is in the eye of the beholder). Is this new generation of AR games going to heat things up?
Helen Papagiannis is a designer specializing in augmented reality. She’s spoken at TEDx about the creative side of AR, which was highlighted as one of the top talks about AR and the gamification of life and worked for the internationally renown Bruce Mau Design.
And now she’s putting out a Augmented Reality Pop-Up Book for mobile devices using image recognition. The book can be enjoyed alone or with the enhanced graphics using an iPad2 or iPhone4.
What I like most about her Pop-Up book is that Helen gets what AR is all about. Or really what it is–a medium to transfer information. If you handed the book and the iPad2 to a child and told them to play around, you wouldn’t have to worry that they wouldn’t “get” augmented reality. They wouldn’t require an explanation or that “AR is that thing on the first down line in football.” They would just play.
Helen is a natural storyteller, as seen by TEDx talk. Even her twitter account is called @ARStories (I wish I’d thought of that one.) She gets that AR is all about telling stories in new and interesting ways, whatever the level of technology. She used the tools at hand, in this case the AR browser Junaio, to make her Pop-Up book.
And as the technology advances, so too will the level of stories being told. I expect from this simple Pop-Up book, that we’ll be seeing more of Helen for quite some time.
ARE2011 is only two days away, and I’m going to miss it (this time its my fault, and I can’t blame Delta Airways). I’m a lame excuse for an AR blogger, I know. If you go there, please shoot some videos and share!
Tish Shute interviews Vernor Vinge on the promise, progress and threats of AR. “I see four or five concurrently active paths to the Singularity … If we humans want to keep our hand in the game, AR is an important thing to pursue.”
Our weekly video comes today from the Future Lions 2011 contest, where young advertising professionals are called to “Advertise a product from a global brand in a way that couldn’t have been done five years ago, to an audience of your choosing”. Tom Houser and Victoria Trow came up a way to use augmented reality as an alternative source of income for record companies. I am a bit of a skeptic, but it’s an interesting idea nonetheless:
Took a break last week (missed me? you should follow me on Twitter), back today with many AR links:
Happy Mother’s Day! It can be even happier if you get your Mom an AR cake (via DMFO)
Tish Shute and Ori Inbar hold an interview with Bruce Sterling – it doesn’t make sense to write fiction about augmented reality nowadays as AR is not fictional topic anymore.
As part of the ARE2011 media blitz, Sterling was also interviewed, together with Vernor Vinge on ReadWriteWeb about augmented reality in the workplace.
Plush toys on sale at a virtual store, existing only in the augmented world of Layar.
Straight outta the box this one seems pretty boring until you think about how well Groupon is doing. Plus, the people *behind* the person with the Junaio based coupons will be happy. No more waiting for the lady in front of you to dig through her purse for twenty minutes to find all the right coupons. Presto. Magic. Coupons on your smartphone.
Valpak Launches Location Based Coupons with junaio Augmented Reality Partner
Consumers have a fun, easy way to save money, find coupons on the go through the augmented reality application
LARGO, FL and SAN FRANCISCO – March 29, 2011 – Valpak Direct Marketing Systems / Cox Target Media and junaio today announced the Valpak coupons will now be available on the junaio app, allowing consumers to save money at nearby businesses with geo-targeted coupons that pop up on their smartphones.
With the Valpak coupons on the junaio app, consumers don’t wait to receive coupons, the geo-location coupons are available whenever they want them. The app launches the smartphone’s camera and GPS to overlay a set of 3D icons in real-time, showing the available Valpak coupons in the vicinity as the user scans the surroundings, with a radius varying from 5 feet to 20 miles away. The coupons and offers literally “pop up” on the screen.
Users can view local coupons, savings and deal offers from the convenience of smartphones anywhere and anytime, and find deals from thousands of local and national brands using the app. Consumers can view and redeem Valpak mobile coupon offers for their favorite businesses in the area by showing the local merchant the Valpak coupon(s) displayed on their smartphone.
The Valpak coupon channel puts the consumer at the center focus, delivering content based on the consumer’s location, or geo-location. The app uses the innovative technology of augmented reality, which combines real and virtual, making the experience interactive and 3D.
The Valpak coupon channel on the junaio app is the world’s largest augmented reality mobile coupon application. To experience this feature, users can download the free junaio application, created by metaio, the leader in AR technology, from either the iTunes Store or Android Market and select the “Local Coupons by Valpak” channel.
“Providing Valpak content on the junaio platform extends the reach our advertisers achieve when they purchase Valpak advertising,” according to Nancy Cook, Vice President of New Media Business Development for Valpak/Cox Target Media. “Our content distribution strategy is to be everywhere consumers look for savings. Valpak content appears on many different apps and platforms. That’s good for consumers and good for our advertisers.”
“Partnering with junaio gives us access to a new audience and gives them a fun, interactive way to see which local businesses are offering savings, and then connect to the offer,” said Cook. “Now consumers can find discounts on their favorite nearby businesses as they are walking by them or discover new favorites in the neighborhood.
”In addition to this augmented reality, app, the familiar Blue Envelope and Valpak.com, Valpak offers available via apps for the five major mobile platforms, recently launched Valpak Deals daily deals site, and offers SMS texting for advertisers.
Personally, I find tablet devices boring (not that I will object getting one). They simply pale in comparison to some of Mac Funamizu’s creations. But, as the iPad2 is all the rage right now, here are a few augmented reality demos running on it, making it a little bit cooler.
If you have a video of your AR app running on the iPad2, shoot me an email or leave a comment.
String on an iPad 2:
Metaio’s Junaio on an iPad 2:
Total Immersion’s Magic Mirror on an iPad 2 (first covered by Thomas):
** Cool experience with the smartphone and seeing into another location. Would love to be able to walk around or zoom in. Next step is to offer a live feed from various locations of the Superbowl during the game. Maybe next year.
Steelers and Packers Magically Come to Life in USA TODAY
Super Bowl Coverage to Include Augmented Reality
SAN FRANCISCO, MUNICH, (February 3rd, 2011) – When the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Green Bay Packers meet on Sunday at the Dallas Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, Texas, to go head to head at this year’s Super Bowl, fans will be able to enrich their experience with augmented reality tidbits, courtesy of USA TODAY and junaio, the most advanced Augmented Reality browser. For smartphone users, the Friday, February 4th edition of USA TODAY will include a 360 degree tour of the Dallas Cowboys stadium, presented by Jerry Jones, stadium and Cowboys owner, along with interior and exterior highlights. The Monday, February 7th edition will give readers a 3D view of the “Play of the Game” in an animated sequence and an option to receive player stats. Pepsi and Papa John’s are sponsoring the two augmented reality experiences.
The new Cowboys Stadium, opened in May 2009, is the largest domed stadium in the world and a marvel of architecture and technology. How suiting of USA TODAY to employ the leading edge technology of Augmented Reality to allow the Cowboys’ owner Jerry Jones to introduce his impressive sports palace to football fans nationwide. All that is required is to download the free app junaio from Apple’s iPhone App Store or the Android Market Place.
With the junaio channel “USATODAY 360 Stadium Tour”, the viewer finds himself right in the middle of the Cowboys Stadium enjoying a 360 degree view as he moves the camera around his own position. Clicking on the screen lets the user jump to where the players enter the stadium, down into the locker rooms or to view some of the famous murals of contemporary art decorating the interior of this fabulous stadium.
For people reading about the game in USA TODAY’s Monday February 7th edition, junaio’s image recognition technology brings to life the Super Bowl “Play of the Game” in the junaio channel “USATODAY SuperBowl Key Play”. This is presented not as a video, but as a 3D animation, created within hours of the game, whereby the viewer’s camera angle is determined by the smartphone’s position relative to the newspaper picture so that every player’s move can be studied from different angles.
“This cooperation between USA TODAY and junaio”, says Peter Meier, the developer of junaio, “is another great example of our vision of the ‘Augmented City’ and how augmented reality is able to bring additional value to everyday life. Just as junaio lets the viewer look inside the Cowboys Stadium, it can also assist buyers, looking for office space on the real estate market, to get a first glimpse of a vacant office by simply clicking on the building. And the second example of the 3D game play animation demonstrates how print editorials and even news can be augmented with digital displays, thereby enriching the reader’s experience.”
About junaio®
junaio is the world’s most advanced mobile Augmented Reality browser and growing daily with interesting content relevant to a viewer’s location or triggered through images and objects the camera is pointing at. The unmatched ease of use, great choice of content and superior features make junaio everybody’s daily companion, an instant source of information about places, events, bargains or objects in the world around us. Features are: location based services using onboard GPS and compass, highly accurate positioning, even inside buildings or exhibition sites, object recognition and natural feature tracking useful for scaling and integrating graphic overlays or 3D models into the real world. Two-way interaction between the user and the displayed AR overlays allow gaming and other virtual experiences. And of course the full range of multimedia displays, including text, image, sound, video. junaio was created by metaio GmbH, the worldwide leader in Augmented Reality.
Robert Scoble, the interviewer of the geek-stars and employee of Rackspace, recorded this video at Metaio in Munich. The gang at Metaio shows off a virtual dragon clinging to a building and talks about their AR browser Junaio. If the only thing you want to know about is dragons invading your home, fast forward to 3:15 in the video to get your fix.
Games Alfresco 