A startup called Atheer unveiled a platform for 
superimposing the information form the web on the real world using the cloud and a gesture-interface. But the Atheer glasses raises question about the future of design.
Ingress
Ingress is a game developed by Niantic Labs is probably the best AR game available right now. The game allows you to choose between two sides, Enlightened or Resistance. The gameplay will then depend on the choice you make. Your surroundings become the game environment where you will need to collect objects, tap sources of energy or capture enemy territory. The game is currently in closed beta but will soon be made available to the public.
Steve Mann: My “Augmediated” Life - IEEE Spectrum
Steve Mann, a professor in the department of electrical and computer engineering at the University of Toronto, has been designing and wearing computerized eyewear for decades, the gear increasing markedly in sophistication over time.
As stuff like Google Glass becomes mainstream, we’re going to see a lot more wearable computing devices around. But one thing that isn’t clear is how we’ll control them. One idea is to use gesture control, which would enable users to communicate with wearable computers without having to use a whole separate smartphone or other device to do so.
But so far, gesture control for most devices — like the Xbox Kinect, for instance — has depended upon cameras watching user movement. That means remaining in a fixed space and using pre-programmed gestures that are not exactly natural, but can be picked up by cameras. As a result, today’s gesture control technologies are far from perfect. In fact, most to date are just downright bad.
Magic Cube projects a virtual keyboard on any flat surface | CNET News
The device displays a full-size virtual keyboard and multitouch mouse that people can use with their smartphones, tablets, and PCs.
Innovations like Prague’s QR code grocery store located in subway stations around the city have already shown how the online shopping world can still maintain a presence in public spaces. In China, e-commerce site Yihaodian is now launching its augmented reality stores, which give customers the impression of a physical store while they browse online. READ MORE…
Innovega to demonstrate contact lens display today at CES.
I covered the Innovega contact lens here after they revealed details of the product at CES last year. Now the company has announced that a working version of the HUD contact lens will be shown at CES from today.
From January 8th to 11th, Innovega will demonstrate eyewear that offers a clear and simultaneous view of a wearer’s rich media and of their immediate surroundings”.
The Innovega iOptik™ video eyewear is transparent and its ‘virtual canvas’ on which digital content is placed, is the largest anticipated in the industry. Compared to a conventional 42 inch flat-panel television that consumers buy for their living rooms, Innovega’s mobile eyewear accessory will deliver the equivalent of a 240 inch, HD, 3D experience.
Putting on a pair of novel data glasses with an OLED microdisplay allows you to see not only the real world, but also a wealth of virtual information. Imagine looking through a repair manual; the trick here is that you turn the pages using just your eyes.
New DARPA RFP Calls for All-In-One HUD that Sees Through Smoke, In The Dark and In Broad Daylight
DARPA wants a multi-band head-up display, which could be mounted to a helmet or a weapon scope, that combines several wavelengths of light into one image.
Sunny? No problem—the camera can see in visible light. Smoke bomb blocking your view? No sweat; the camera can see thermal infrared signatures. The system would also have near-infrared capability to help users see through darkness.
A new DARPA project called the Pixel Network for Dynamic Visualization (PIXNET) seeks proposals for new sensors that can do all of this in one package. A successful proposal would be small, lightweight, low-power and low-cost, said Nibir Dhar, DARPA program manager for PIXNET.
The system would communicate wirelessly with Android-based smart phones to fuse the images together, like you can see in the inset above. The warfighter would see a scene with visible imagery, thermal sensitivity and near-IR capability all in one.
Existing sensors are a good starting point, but they’re not advanced enough to combine multiple functions the way DARPA wants. Combining reflective and thermal bands will be a challenge, not to mention making it ultra-portable. “What we really need are breakthroughs in aperture design, focal plane arrays, electronics, packaging and materials science,” Dhar said.
(via DARPA Wants Cheap Head-Up Displays That Work In Any Kind Of Light | Popular Science)
(via joshbyard)
Pioneer shows off augmented reality device for cars
Pioneer, a Japanese maker of automotive navigation systems, was in attendance at the CEATEC 2012 event in Japan where it showcased its use of augmented reality in a heads up display for a car. The company has extensive experience in the realm of augmented reality and vehicles and believes that the technology could unlock a new generation of navigation devices for the auto industry. Automakers too have shown interest in augmented reality, adding momentum to Pioneer’s efforts.
The untapped potential of augmented reality | Digital Trends
It seems like augmented reality has been tipped to take off for a few years now, so where is it? Why aren’t we using it in our daily lives?
Augmented reality or AR has been around for years. Back in 2009 we were talking about AR’s potential impact on our lives. The idea of overlaying information on your view of the real world is familiar to everyone. Thanks to sci-fi movies like the Terminator series, we all have a pretty good idea of how useful it could be. The convergence of cameras, location awareness, and apps in our modern smartphones made AR really accessible for the first time. If you care to look, there are a lot of AR apps in Google Play and the App Store. So why isn’t anybody using them?
The potential for AR to impact all elements of our lives is massive: from education to gaming to manufacturing, the world seems poised on the brink of substantial AR adoption – with all associated benefits. Indeed, a recent study by Semico Research predicted that by the end of 2016, revenue produced by the AR Industry will total more than $600 billion. This study also determined that in 2014, approximately 864 million mobile phones will be AR-ready, and in excess of 100 million vehicles will come equipped with AR tech.
Kiji McCafferty
In the summer of 2009, Yelp quietly added a feature to its iPhone app that blurred the line between the real and the virtual. If you held your handset up and looked at the world through its screen, you’d see little floating tags containing the names, user ratings, and other details of businesses around you.
The feature, called Monocle, was an experiment with augmented reality—one of many that appeared around this time, as companies tossed around various ways to mesh digital content with the real world, hoping to catch consumers’ eyes (see “TR10: Augmented Reality” and “New Reality”).
Several years later, augmented reality is still mostly used by early tech adopters, but it’s starting to graze the mainstream, helped by the massive popularity of smartphones and tablets, and their constantly improving processors and sensors, along with the growth of high-speed wireless data networks. Apps featuring augmented reality are available for everything from gaming to driving to furniture arrangement. Slowly but surely, augmented reality is becoming less of a novelty and more of a utility.
Ikea’s Augmented-Reality Catalog Might Be the Company’s Best-Made Product Yet | Gizmodo
We’ve already shared our favorite items from Ikea’s 2013 product catalog, but what we didn’t know was that as of July 31st, the catalog itself will be an interactive product of the latest augmented-reality technology.
iOS and Android users who download the Ikea catalog app, will be able to unlock video features, interactive experiences with products on the page, photo galleries and additional decorating inspiration.
Developed by the creative agency McCann, the AR app is a project that the Swedish build-it-yourself furniture empire has been working on for quite a while, since 2011 when they first expressed interset in bridging the print/digital divide. Linus Karlsson, Global Chief Creative Officer of McCann, explained to Wired that replacing the paper catalog with an entirely digital product wouldn’t make sense, “If you had a magazine that had 211 million copies in circulation, you just would’t end it. That would be crazy.”
With this added digital layer, shopping Ikea’s collection will become a little bit easier—an “X-ray” feature allows you to peer inside cabinets, for example, making a trip to the brick-and-mortar store potentially unnecessary. (Not enough of Ikea’s collection is available for purchase online to cut out a trip to the store entirely.)
Augmented reality growing popular with U.S. military - QR Code Press
The practical applications of augmented reality are gaining more attention, however, especially amongst military and security organizations. A new report from Mind Commerce, a research organization, shows that augmented reality is, indeed, becoming a popular topic within the U.S. military.
