Business Insider on the three issues augmented reality has to resolve in order to become the next big thing. No surprises there, but isn’t AR already the next big thing, and it should rather try to become the current big thing?
Par-Tee – care for some augmented reality golf game?
It seems that I have never posted here about Greg Tran’s work on augmented architecture. Which is a pity. I had the following video opened as a tab in my browser for a long time, just waiting to be published, and somehow I forgot about it. Luckily, Yanko Design posted another video of Tran’s work, which served as a necessary reminder:
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.
A downpour of augmented reality links for you today:
Brother’s AiRScouter see-through head mounted display is coming out this fall? One thing’s for sure, they Brother stresses the AR use cases of that device.
The future of firefighting may be augmented according to Tanagram. As Toby points out, a firefighter wants 100% reliability which doesn’t go well with computer vision dependence on heuristic algorithms.
Not too happy with the shape of your nose? Researchers at the University of London are working on an AR mirror that will let you tweak it (and other features) in real time.
In the last week Bruce Sterling has postedseveraldemovideos of AR projects done by Art Center College of Design (Pasadena) students. The class, which is sponsored by Layar (very wise move!) and guided by Sterling, resulted with some interesting ideas, from AR religion to Bitcoin treasure hunt, but I liked most Dobu Dobu, an “augmented reality app to create love, companionship and friendship through adoption of virtual pets”.
before I fall to sleep, here’s a very short video illustrating Minecraft brought to the real world using augmented reality (more specifically, using Kudan’s Qoncept engine).
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.
If you missed it, we’ve got it, in this week’s linkfest:
Users not waking up to augmented reality mobile apps (via @jack_benott). Here’s an interesting quote: Augmented reality “needs to move away from the “pull” model of using the camera to pull AR data to a “push” model where consumers can receive AR data in a seamless fashion”. This theoretically will happen with the introduction of head up displays, but maybe we can’t wait till then …
The augmented reality pitch that made Justin Timberlake invest in stealth startup Dekko (via @GaryPHayes). I really hope there’s something more to it than this. I do love their chosen company name, though.
I think Layar already did it, but 110 Stories is a Kickstarter project aiming to create an AR (and later physical) memorial the World Trade Center towers.
Daqri’s CEO Brain Mullins gives a keynote talk on San Diego’s ARDevCamp titled “The state of augmented reality“. I may or may not link to it just because I got quoted (but thanks!).
“Inch High Stunt Guy” is not just a game, it also beautifully shows the power of Qualcomm’s AR SDK.
This week’s video comes from Toyota Motor Europe and the Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design, which re-imagined a car’s window for an excibition, and named it “Window to the World”. The result is very attractive, as is evident by the half a million views this video got in the past last week. You probably have already seen it, but if not, here’s a good place to read more about it.
Oh my, what an interesting week for augmented reality, especially in the business front:
Nokia Beta Labs revealed Live View, a revolutionary mobile augmented reality application. Well, unless you consider Wikitude, Layar, Junaio and many other “AR browsers” that came out in the last three years. Nokia was once a leader in AR research, it’s a sad day to see them show off a product like that.
Microsoft licenses GeoVector’s tech. Slashgear says the goal of this move is to challenge Google Goggles. Patent war against Google (like the current one against Android) can be another reason.
This week’s video features a cool street art by SWEZA named QRadio. Graffiti boom-boxes around Berlin start to play music when the QR code drawn on them is scanned. Via Wooster Collective.
How are terracotta warriors, billiard, a coloring book and the city of Basel all related to each other? Well… they are featured in this week’s linkfest:
Developers, rejoice! Our old friends at YDreams have released a beta version of YVision, a natural user interface SDK that has computer vision and a physics engine baked into it.
HitLab NZ introduces first(?) coloring book that comes to life with a bit of augmented reality.
If you are a Layar developer, AR-4-Basel may be the contest for you (via @genebecker).
Two years ago I wrote about Deep Green the robotic, augmented reality pool player from Canada. Now a student from Germany created a mini version.
An augmented reality artwork created by John Goto and Matthew Leach using the Layar platform, Gilt City confronts the banking crisis in an unusual way. Famous beggars appear on your mobile’s screen, and you choose whether to help them, or make them explode. Art – I’ll never understand it, but maybe you will, by reading more about this project here.
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?
Had a very good trip to the US (apart from the trans-atlantic flights) and now I’m back! Let’s see what I have been missing –
Modojo laments the sad state of augmented reality video games: “Thus far, no company has been willing to create an augmented reality video game based on a million selling series. Everything’s a new intellectual property, which is usually a hard sell, even without AR”.
The above article mentions Reality Fighters, published by Sony, which actually looks pretty cool.
Design concept: Papyrus – communication with time, augmented reality display of buildings’ past glory. This concept is not that far-fetched, seeing that Layar has “historic layers”.
It’s been a while since we have featured a kinect hack in the weekly video spot, so I’m happy to present, Saint Kinect, created by Youtube user koshiik with “100 lines of code and 2 beers”. Fight the devil wearing a halo on your head –
Games Alfresco 