Augmented Planet » News

Augmented Planet on the BBC

lester — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 09:25:37 +0000

On Monday I received a call from the BBC here in the UK, asking if I was interested in taking part in a program about augmented reality and mobile gaming. Yesterday I found myself at the BBC studios in London being plied with makeup and taking part in a short interview on what augmented reality is and what it means to game developers. After that it was a trip down to the Blue Peter Gardens to so some filming of demos.

I was asked to explain the history of augmented reality and the types of applications available on mobile devices, and how the technology can be used in mobile games. I manage to squeeze in some demos, since the news segment will be limited to only a minute or two, it will be interesting to see what they use.

I focused my demos on the various aspects of AR:

Image recognition

oMoby – object recognition
Snaptell – image recognition/shopping
Sudoku Solver – OCR and entertainment

Camera view / location

GetLondonReading – educational location application
Gigaputt – location based gaming
TagDis – location based gaming
Wikitude – classic AR browser

Natural feature recogntion

Junaio – Junaio Glue
Upsies – Football game

The program also features Tim Kring who is talking about Change For Good (the Nokia location based augmented reality game), and a demo of the Parrot AR Drone (the flying helicopter you control with your iPhone). We were there as independent augmented reality experts giving an overview. A special thanks to our friends over at the Guardian (www.guardian.co.uk) for nominating us for the opportunity.

The program goes out on Saturday and will be shown all day on BBC News 24 as well as part of the news on various BBC channels. It will also be available online. I have to admit, I’m both nervous and excited, I’m not sure I’ll be able to bring myself to watch it.

Augmented Planet comes to the iPhone

lester — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 10:36:10 +0000

It’s finally happen, after a lot of effort and hair pulling, the Augmented Planet augmented reality news application has finally hits the App Store and is available for download for iPhone users.

The application allows readers to keep up to date with:

The latest Augmented Planet blog posts
News from the augmented reality industry
Augmented reality related tweets
Interesting augmented reality videos on YouTube

And if you’re still looking for more augmented reality content, you can find links to the top augmented reality bloggers covering augmented reality.

You can download the application from the App Store here:

Total Immersions Augmented Reality on Sky News

lester — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 10:57:55 +0000

Total Immersion, the people behind great demos such as Avatar, Transformers, + many more had a great spot on the Sky News Technology Unplugged program.

Take a look at Myles Peyton from Total Immersion in action.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=v8eXlcy1TyU

It’s excellent to see augmented reality hitting the news, the interviewer looks blown away by Myles’ demo

Watch Live Augmented Reality Demos
Myles will be speaking at Augmented Planet London on the 12th May so for your chance to watch live demos from Total Immersion and other augmented reality experts, and meet people from the industry book your free ticket now.

(Total Immersion will also be at the Gadget Show Live on the 7th – 11th April in Birmingham (UK) – www.gadgetshowlive.net)

Ultimate Guide To iPhone Augmented Reality Part I

lester — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 17:20:28 +0000

All the apps from the appstore

The number of augmented reality applications for the iPhone has grown significantly since I started this blog. The guys over at TechCrunchies say that in 2009 there were over 1 million augmented reality applications downloaded. By 2014 that figure is expected to rise to a staggering 400 million. 30% of that is expected to be generated by downloads of augmented reality games. Check out the TechCrunchies website for more interesting data.

With those numbers now is a good time to be thinking about releasing an augmented reality application, but what’s out there in the appstore already? Searching the appstore for ‘augmented reality’ used to produce a single page of results, these days there are hundreds of apps all fighting for your attention and hard earned pennies. We thought we would take a look and see what applications are available. Welcome to part one of the ultimate guide to iPhone augmented reality applications.

We ignored the official appstore categories, some developers listed their applications in the strangest categories in an attempt to find consumers. To make it more of a level playing field we have done a bit of rejigging.

Eduction
There are quite a few apps that call themselves augmented reality educational apps, but when you dig deeper some are little more than utilities. For example there is an app that tells you what is on the opposite side of the planet from your current location. Interesting yes, educational no.

After arranging the categories somewhat we found very few ‘real’ educational augmented reality applications.

Pocket Universe
Star Chart

Both applications are astronomy applications that show the constellations and locations of the planets, both cost $2.99. My personal favourite here is Pocket Universe. Pocket Universe has a cool feature that uses augmented reality and the compass to help you find your target. If you’re interested in finding Jupiter and you need help, just select the relevant option and you’ll be guided to the target by arrows. It works well for bright objects but for objects that are either really dim or where you’ll need a telescope it’s not very useful as it can be a few feet off.

Learn about the cosmos with augmented reality star finders

Utilities
I always wanted an application to see where the satellites are, not for any particular reason just out of curiosity. If you install satellites for a living then you have a few apps available but they are expensive (as much as $19.99). Given the accuracy of Pocket Universe and its ability to pinpoint an object I’m not sure that I would rely on an application to complete an installation. They will help point you in the right direction but you’ll still need a sat bleeper to complete the install and tweak the signal.

DishPointer
DishPointer AR Pro
Satellite Augmented Reality
Satellite Sliderule Pro

: Find a satellite

If you have problems remembering where you left your car then there are a couple of apps that can help you.
iParking find my car (free)
Car Finder
cARLocator
iFindit AR
icar Augmented reality

Dude Where's My Car?

It’s worth pointing out that the acrossair augmented reality browser has the ability to locate your car as well.

A couple of misc utilities:

AugMeasure
If you’re stuck without a tape measure then AugMeasure will give you a virtual measure. It’s free so good for estimates but don’t go out and by new carpet based on it’s measurements.

Color i
Interesting application that will give you the hex/rgb color value of objects you point the camera at.

It's Orange but what shade?

C2 YouTube
GeoTag your YouTube videos

Music
Someone will need to educate me on augmented music, I’m not convinced. Light Squares puts squares you can press into the real world view, and that’s about it.

Trippy
RjDj
Kids on DSP
Little Boots
Light Squares
That’s it for part one, still plenty of more apps to come.

Announcing AugmentedRealityNews Publisher Network

lester — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 11:41:47 +0000

Good morning, it’s been a while. I spent a month in Brazil with the In-laws and never really had the opportunity to blog. Apologies to everyone who sent me email. My inbox is overflowing so is a priority over the next few days.

Announcing AugmentedRealityNews

Interest in augmented reality is growing, over the last few months many new blogs have been created and we continue to see the introduction of new products all competing for our attention. Keeping track of all the news and products sources is becoming more and more difficult, so we have created the first augmented reality publisher network.

AugmentedRealityNews is an aggregator service that will search out augmented reality headlines and bring them together into one single source making it easy for you to find the latest news. The article is never hosted on AugmentedRealityNews so you’ll always link back to the original website for the full article. We hope this service will be useful to readers by making it easier to find new and interesting content and to publishers by driving relevant traffic to your site and enabling you to reach out to new readers.

All the news, all the info, all the time

For readers
AugmentedRealityNews is your one stop shop for all things AR. We’ll seek out the headlines from blogs, products and news sources and bring them together into one single list. The newest articles will always be listed at the top (and timestamped) so you’ll know what’s happening right now. The page will refresh every 5 minutes so you’ll always have the latest headlines as they are published.

AugmentedRealityNews can be accessed at either augmentedrealitynews.info or arnews.info

For publishers
If you blog about augmented reality or have an augmented reality product you can list your RSS feed in the AugmentedRealityNews publisher network. Once approved, the headline of the post will automatically be shown on the AugmentedRealityNews site. When a user clicks the headline they will be taken directly to your site to read the article.

Click here to find out how you list your site.

AugmentedRealityNews is still a beta, there are lots of improvements that need to be made, but feel free to give it a test drive and any comments welcome.

Announcing Meetup For Augmented Reality Enthusiasts

New Augmented Reality Trading Cards Are Topps

lester — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 11:22:25 +0000

One of my first posts back in May when this blog was only a few weeks old was about the 3D trading cards from Topps. At the time Topps had released augmented reality baseball trading cards that you could interact with rather than just marvel at. The premise was you buy the Topps trading card, get it home and visit the website, hold up the trading card to your webcam and you get to play as the baseball player on the card. Pretty sweet. As a kid we use to collect trading cards and stick them in albums and that would be the end of it.

Hot off the heels of that success, Topps and Total Immersion announced today that they have extended the range of trading cards to cover football. The new Topps 3D Live football cards feature quarterbacks who pop up from specially designated cards to fire passes to virtual receivers, all the while seeking to keep away from defensive obstacles.

Every pack of Topps 2009 Football contains one interactive code card. Fans log on to www.toppstown.com, enter the Topps 3D Live section and select the player on the code card. Once the player is selected and the program is initialized, it’s time for the snap from center. When the card is held under a webcam, the quarterback springs to life, onscreen. Fans control the action with a few keystrokes.

If you’re into football, baseball or just looking for something cool then it’s well worth picking up a pack to play. Be sure to checkout the Topps 3D cards website- www.toppstown.com

Being in the UK I’m more in to soccer but I have been to an (American) football game. Many years ago I went to see the Seattle Seahawks, sadly it was 3 hours out my life that I’ll never see again but the cheerleaders were a big plus point. I also went to see a baseball game, Boston Red Sox. I was sitting above the exit and accidental kicked half a pint of Guinness over the edge. Unfortunately it landed on some guy walking up the stairs. Dripping with Guinness and red with rage he was screaming at the guy next to me blaming him for the incident why I cried with laughter. Sorry dude.

If we could have some Topps cards for soccer that would be cool.

Full press release from Topps & Total Immersion

TOPPS AND TOTAL IMMERSION HUDDLE UP,

UNVEIL ‘3D LIVE’ FOOTBALL CARDS: NFL QUARTERBACKS ON

VIRTUAL GRIDIRON COME TO LIFE VIA AUGMENTED REALITY

Cards Build on Game-Changing Introduction of 3D Live Baseball Cards,

Enable Kids and Collectors to Play Ball with the Pros at ToppsTown.com

LOS ANGELES and NEW YORK (September 23, 2009) – If the prospect of being a Monday morning quarterback every day of the week grabs you, you can now get in the game, thanks to the Topps Company, Total Immersion and the magic of augmented reality.

The two companies today introduced “Topps 3D Live” football trading cards featuring star National Football League quarterbacks who come to play, at www.toppstown.com, Topps’ virtual sports community.

Building on the success of its groundbreaking 3D Live baseball cards for Topps, Total Immersion, the global leader in augmented reality, is bringing Ben Roethlisberger, Tom Brady, Eli and Peyton Manning, Donovan McNabb and other star quarterbacks to life in 3D, for the 2009 NFL season.

Topps, the leading creator and marketer of sports and related cards, is delivering a new level of interactive gameplay via the new football cards, introducing a highly engaging experience where virtual components are merged into a live video stream in real time.

The new Topps 3D Live football cards feature quarterbacks who pop up from specially designated cards to fire passes to virtual receivers, all the while seeking to keep away from defensive obstacles.

“With 3D Live NFL cards, Topps is continuing to innovate, bringing greater interactivity to game play for fans and collectors alike,” said Steve Grimes, Chief Digital Officer, Topps. “We’re fans of augmented reality, and the quarterback game we’ve developed with Total Immersion is simple, engaging and fun.”

“Marrying football with augmented reality was a natural after the game-changing success of Topps 3D Live baseball cards,” said Bruno Uzzan, CEO and co-founder, Total Immersion (www.t-immersion.com). “These cards put fans in the huddle with their favorite NFL quarterback, and demonstrate yet again how augmented reality gets the consumer into the action like nothing else. That’s the kind of engagement that AR delivers consistently.”

3D Live augmented reality football cards are the newest attraction at Topps Town, an online sports community. The site was unveiled in June 2008 as part of the iconic company’s plans to expand into the digital space. Topps was recently named the exclusive card supplier to Major League Baseball.

About The Topps Company, Inc.

Founded in 1938, Topps (www.topps.com) is a leading creator and marketer of sports and related cards, entertainment products, and distinctive confectionery. Topps entertainment products include Major League Baseball, NFL, NBA, and other trading cards, sticker album collections, and collectible games. The company’s confectionary brands include “Bazooka” bubble gum, “Ring Pop,” “Push Pop,” “Baby Bottle Pop,” and “Juicy Drop Pop” lollipops. In June 2008, Topps unveiled ToppsTown (www.toppstown.com), the first online sports community for kids, bringing the popularity of trading cards with the exploding world of web-based social networking.

About Total Immersion

Total Immersion (www.t-immersion.com) is the global leader in augmented reality. Through its patented D’Fusion™ technology, Total Immersion blurs the line between the virtual world and the real world by integrating real time interactive 3D graphics into a live video stream. Leading the augmented reality category since 1999, the company maintains a presence in Europe and the U.S., and supports a network of partners worldwide

Mobilizy Shape The Future Of Augmented Reality

lester — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 10:47:49 +0000

The press release from Mobilizy (the guys behind wikitude) was released yesterday. I have to admit that I didn’t see that one coming. For those that missed it, Mobilizy have proposed the creation of an open Augmented Reality Markup Language (ARML) to the AR Consortium. The framework covers displaying geographical annotations and location specific data within an augmented reality browser applications. What will that mean to you and me? Well the obvious benefits are an open standard will ensure that all augmented reality data could be accessed on any browser application.

Think of all those Points Of Interest (POIs) that you have for your GPS, you don’t have to hunt around for POIs that match you device, they just work. Because the POIs are an agreed standard anyone can create them and anyone can use them, the same goes for the proposed ARML standard, anyone will be able to create lists of their favorite things and make them available to other augmented reality users which can be used regardless of the application or device.

Augmented Reality Markup Language (ARML)

www.youtube.com/watch?v=qvfEORp-fhU

The full press release can be found at: http://www.mobilizy.com/enpress-release-mobilizy-proposes-arml

Mobilizy will be at the Over The Air Event event this Friday (25th Sept) held at Imperial College in London, so it will be an excellent chance to meet up with them and ask them questions.

An introduction to the ARML specification is available here: http://www.openarml.org,, but if your keen to get involved they are offering limited access to the preview version their upcoming ARML browser. If you want early access or have additional questions about ARML you can contact them directly at: arml@mobilizy.com

Quiet Thursday augmented reality update

lester — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 11:05:41 +0000

Layar is global

Sorry no blog for the last 2 days. There hasn’t been that much news around and I have been trying to get some DIY done but suffering from motivational issues.

There was an interesting article posted up on venturebeat yesterday discussing which of the augmented reality start-ups are most ready for market and will survive. It’s worth a read (full article).

Layar released a new video to annouce they are now global. As next week is the picnic in the park in Amsterdam expect more news to come out of the Layar guys as I’m sure we’ll see some annoucements come out of the event.

Layar is global video

www.youtube.com/watch?v=nkPHDMVxKn0

Nokia released an augmented reality vision video last week and it hasn’t gone down too well. You can read the general slating they received here. It’s an interesting video but really only focus on how augmented reality will enable you to interact with your phone, eg read/send SMS messages. It’s a scary concept to think that people will be driving down the road sending SMS with their eyes.

Nokia’s augmented reality vision

www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGwvZWyLiBU

A quick update on the augmented reality event for London, it’s still in process, we are just looking for a suitable venue. It would be nice to hold it at a companies office who are involved with augmented reality so we are hunting down sponsors in the London area. My team of crack event people are out there chasing people. We’ll go for plan B if we have no luck in the next few days. Either way we are aiming to announce the date/venue next week.

Augmented Reality News Digest 14/9/09

lester — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 17:54:21 +0000

Sorry for the late blog today, I have been trying to get my CV done so I can start looking for a job. So despite my lateness let me do a bit of a news digest.

Getting a lot of attention and being billed as Google Earth meets augmented reality is this blog post and video (below). I’m not really convinced that it’s an augmented reality solution. Don’t get me wrong it looks good and I looking forward to playing around with it, but calling it augmented reality is stretching it a bit. Read the article and watch the video and decide for yourself.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPk88soc2qw

Revolution Magazine must be having an augmented reality day today, having brought us the Google Earth story above they also have a feature on the top 10 augmented reality campaigns. There isn’t really anything new in there, nothing that we haven’t been talking about for a few weeks now but that’s the power of twitter. What goes around comes around again and again.

In a similar vein this is yet another article focused on the top demos. As above there isn’t really much new but the article is interesting from a marketing and sales perspective. If you don’t have the time or patience then just watch the video.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgett5Od3G4

That’s it for today, now back to the CV.