Augmented Reality

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Apple's Ecosystem Is Actually Your Body

Andrew Orr ·

Apple’s ecosystem is your body. It’s in our pockets, our ears, our wrists, and soon it will be over our eyes with augmented reality glasses. Lucas Rizzotto talks about Apple hardware can be thought of as a modular system, similar to what Bryan and I discussed on ACM. iPhone will provide processing power and networking, Apple Watch is for biometrics and input, AirPods give us contextual 3D audio, and Apple Glasses are our screen.

Ultimately, Apple’s final AR product offering won’t just be a set of glasses — but an interconnected ecosystem that can itself become a single, immersive computing platform. One that’s an extension of you and your body — whether you’re wearing glasses or not.

Podcast

Apple Infrastructure, Attention to Details, Apple Car/AR/Glasses, with John Martellaro - ACM 501

Bryan Chaffin · · Add Comment

Does Apple have the infrastructure it needs for a cohesive future? Once that seemed clear, but Bryan Chaffin and guest-host John Martellaro say it’s become harder to see, if so. They then pivot to how augmented reality will figure into Apple’s future plans and products. They cap the show by weighing Apple’s ability to pay attention to details as the company grows.

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Apple Cloud Gaming and Augmented Reality

Andrew Orr ·

Rumors point to Apple creating a gaming subscription service. This Medium post suggest it might be something called “cloud gaming” where you don’t download anything. Sounds perfect for a thin client like Apple Glasses, although gaming is more of a VR thing. Speaking of AR though, there’s a new executive for that.

Between, Apple, Sony, and many other large tech companies (or startups comprised of people from these companies), we’re bound to soon have a reality with fast and reliable cloud gaming.

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HTC Shows Eye-Tracking Tech in Vive VR Headsets

Bryan Chaffin ·

HTC showed off a new eye-tracking tech in its Vive VR headset line. Vive is aimed at the VR world, rather than the AR world being targeted by Apple, but AR and VR are kissing cousins, and this is interesting. The idea is simply that the headset can track your eye movements, which can then be used to activate menu and navigation controls. I think Apple is right to focus on AR, but there is obviously a big future in VR, too, and if HTC can bring this to market, it will make them a real player in that space. TheNextWeb has a good writeup from CES on this:

The biggest splashes came in the form of the new Cosmos hardware (an Oculus Go/Quest competitor) and a new eye-tracking system to be debuted in an update to the Vive Pro called “Vive Pro Eye.” Eye-tracking is a big deal for VR. The Vive Pro Eye, according to HTC, will accurately monitor users’ eye movements inside the headset.

Plugo is an AR STEM Gaming System for Kids
Cool Stuff Found

Plugo is an AR STEM Gaming System for Kids

Andrew Orr ·

Plugo is an immersive AR STEM gaming system for kids, and right now it’s a Kickstarter project. Plugo comes with four gaming kits: Quest, Count, Link, and Steer. Designed for kids between the ages of 5 and 11 years, each kit comes with many exciting educational games that are conceptualized to make your child learn, play and have fun—all at the same time. The gamepad is compatible with multiple iOS and Android (Samsung) tablets and smartphones, iPad, iPhone, Samsung Galaxy and more. No wires, no electronics or additional hardware; the gaming system requires minimum effort to set-up and play. The project has met its goal of US$25,000. Rewards start at US$35 and the estimated delivery is March 2019.

Cool Stuff Found

The Future Was Posted to Twitter Last Friday

Bryan Chaffin ·

Check out this amazing demo video from developer Harley Turan. He posted it to Twitter on Friday, just a few days after Apple’s WWDC keynote. In it, he attached live data to a real-world object using ARKit 2 and iOS 12, and then moves them around. It’s like an ordinary commercial using thousands of dollars in post-production software, only it’s life. Put another way, it’s the future, posted to Twitter a few days ago. When people doubt the real-world value of augmented reality, this is the sort of thing I think about. Not games, as great I expect Harry Potter: Wizards Unite to be, but rather information attached to real world locations and objects. Especially once we get past this stone-age era of holding our iPhones in front of our faces to get our augmented reality. Oh, and remember that this was after just a couple of days with hands-on iOS 12 and ARKit 2.