With Augmented Reality, next iPhone app may help navigate a garden maze
May 22nd, 2009 |
The iPhone has emerged as the prototypical Mobile Web 3.0 platform, and, along with the Google Android, is driving developers to redefine end user mobile computing.
Fueled by rumors of new capabilities soon to be available with the iPhone, developers are becoming particularly excited about applications in the emerging field of Augmented Reality. Augmented Reality, as Google Android Developer Enkin explains it, “bridges the gap between reality and classic map-like representations, (and) combines GPS, orientation sensors, 3D graphics, live video, several web services, and a novel user interface into an intuitive and light navigation system for mobile devices.” Simply put, Augmented Reality combines realtime information, like video input to an iPhone or Android, and adds to it computer-generated information for relevance, context, user guidance, etc.
As long as you have a properly equipped iPhone or Android, you can find your way out
The applications for Augmented Reality are truly limitless. Augmented Reality would take applications that were once based on “coarse” GPS data (maybe as precise as a particular street address), and allow the delivery of services that better understand the location and orientation of the mobile device, and supplement realtime data, to allow a user to do incredibly precise things. An Augmented Reality application could visually guide a tourist to the nearest train station; help a shopper walk to a specific item in a store; or superimpose property lines on a live video image.
This is not sci-fi. Enkin and others have demonstrated persuasive AR proofs-of-concept. As Chris Grayson points out on his GigantiCo blog, “Every piece of this technology already exists in the wild. This is not a great technological leap. This is merely smart convergence.” (Chris’s post is where I first learned about Augmented Reality, and is well worth a read.)
As with all technological developments, some people are responding with skepticism. As an inventor, I know a little bit about combining existing technologies to create new devices and applications that really challenge our thinking. Augmented Reality seems to me a very interesting development, and one that has the potential to change our world.
Tags: iPhone, Google Android, Augmented Reality, Enkin, Mobile Web 3.0, convergence
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Pingback by Posts about google android as of May 22, 2009 | Neto Cury — May 22, 2009 @ 6:58 pm
Do you recall quoting me in your article last September?
Question:
> What do current apps tell us about
> the future of social media?
http://tinyurl.com/socializedpr
Answer:
> Augmented Reality.
This is precisely what I’ve been talking about. But I cannot claim credit, the idea is not new. But what I’ve been saying is that the convergence of these technologies is upon us. It has now dropped into the price range that Augmented Reality is becoming commercially viable to pursue development of on a mass market platform.
Here is another blog post about some of the history behind augmented and virtual reality.
http://tinyurl.com/virtual-reality-pt1
Thank you for posting this article and thank you so much sourcing mine. I have more to say on the subject, so this conversation will continue.
cheers,
Chris
Comment by Chris Grayson - GigantiCo — May 22, 2009 @ 11:15 pm
Chris,
I do recall that. Very prophetic on your part. I write speeches for CEOs and other executives. Often, these involve technology visions, musings on where the industry could go. I wrote one last year for the CTO of a semiconductor company which included among its future scenarios an application which would allow the user to put his/her iPhone up to the radio to identify a song. That wild vision became a reality a couple of months after the keynote. These predictions seem to have a very short shelf life.
Comment by joel — May 22, 2009 @ 11:28 pm
I have started a facebook group petitioning Apple to open the API for video augmentation. This will allow agmented reality apps in the store! Please join and pass it on:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=105162007611
Comment by loerchner — July 11, 2009 @ 7:23 pm