Now out for the Sony PSP, (For Europe and Australia), a monster collector game that makes Pokemon look "so last year". Invizimals uses your PSP camera , equipped with a Go!Cam, you can hunt , trap, and battle creatures in Augmented Reality. (Who says you need a smartphone to experience AR?)
Sony isn't new at AR, either. Remember Eye of Judgment? "Oh yeah...that game!" High quality is a Sony tradition, imo, and it seems to hold true here, as well.
Check out this Gamespot video. Sure, the interviewee is awkward, but the video gives you a really good feel for how the game flows..Expected NA release is Q3 2010 (in roughly 50 days).
I like the fact that good AR isn't being confined to "smartphones". Given the power, (and number) of PSP's out there, hooking the young gamers of today is seeding the AR-competent consumers of tomorrow. For as long as there's a market, the technology can only increase, and we all win.
Ahoy, there! I loves me a good piratey-themed game, and this one looks fun. This one takes the augmented reality to an interesting place. First, you download the app to your iPhone/iPad, Then, you go to the game website, and sync your app to the game. To play, you utilize the accelerometers in your phone to "row" your way to viscory. Just think, your umpteen dollar iPhone/iPad can now act as a Wii remote!
ImmesiveTech.org just posted this great video from Keiichi Matsuda, which was recently shown at the London's 3D festival. Why does the video look "off"? Because it's meant to be viewed in 3D, but you get the idea, even without stereoscopic projection, or those funky red-and-blue lenses.
Very reminiscent of the Domestic Robocop video, I had to laugh watching all the little adverts following the guy down the street. Reminded me heavily of Denno Coil. (At least they could be filtered, and don't contribute to global pollution)
Title catch your interest? The fact that you're here proves the marketing department correct. *sigh* The "SFW" denotes "Safe For Work", not Shockwave Flash.
Augmented Reality is a visual medium, and more and more it's become a marketing medium. Since "sex sells", both the geeks and the marketing companies raise their cry in unison:"Let there be women!".
Let's face it: being physical creatures, it's only natural that "Human Nature" will permeate everything we do, and the same marketing that drove development of home video, the internet, and late-night "chat lines" will be present in every form of advertising from cave paintings to augmented reality. (And yes, companies like Pink Visual are working on it). Let's take a brief, (and SFW) look at what has been done. Your imagination will naturally "fill in the blanks".
Example 1: Lynx Mynx Magnet
A natural extension of technology brought to you by the "cheeky monkeys" at Lynx, (known for their funny and blatantly suggestive ads, known also by the "Axe" brand), these guys have social demographic targeting down to a near science. The above video is for the "Lynx Mynx Magnet" , where the "Lynx Mynx" denotes their user-voted models, from the "Lynx Lounge After Hours"
Example 2 : Virtual Suzi
"Gawd, I love women with British accents. Especially if they're in full leather. Especially, especially if they know geek tech" Yes, you can have Suzi Perry (presenter from The Gadget Show) in the palm of your hands...as if you wouldn't be eating out of hers, right? You can check her..uh, I mean 'the technology', out HERE.
Example 3:Playboy Magazine
Of course, the world's most famous magazine, (read globally "for the articles" ), would push the marketing envelope, right alongside Esquire, right?
Is this an exhaustive list? Certainly not. And the industry, as always, will push the technological envelope. There's more out there, and there will be ever more to come, unless Human Nature suddenly nullifies itself...and I doubt that's gonna happen.
Well, here's a neat video from the company, viZoo. Check out their video (below) and prepare to be impressed. With the combination of real world objects, and seamless virtual ones, the Flare 320 makes for a stunning visual.It's so slick and streamlined, you gotta wonder what makes this "magic box" tick?( hint: Think "smoke and mirrors") Sure, it *looks* like it might be a microwave, but it's High Definition makes you question what is real, and what is rendered..and that's High Art, in my opinion. When you watch it for the first time, see if you can distinguish the real from the augmented, before it becomes obvious.
As part of the advertising release for the upcoming Columbia Pictures release "The Green Hornet", (based on the radio show from the 30's, and the 1966 movie, ), you can experience the "Black Beauty" (GH's version of the Batmobile), at it's own site: experienceblackbeauty.com . You first need to download, print and fold the marker, and let the games begin! With the marker you can watch the trailer, but that's not the fun stuff. The fun is rotating the marker to fire missles, flame throwers, and the Gatling Gun. Suh-weet!
Wow, miss a few days (camping off the digital grid) and you miss a lot, So, I'll be playing a bit of 'catch up' for the next few posts. Here's a neat little art installation , utilizing the concepts of AR (without a HMD/Smartphone), designed by Daniel Franke and Markus Kison, called "Durchsehen Exp. 01 (augmented perspective)",
Using a facial-recognition camera that calculates the viewer's angle of perspective, it overlays images (including a "pass through" view, as if one were looking *through* the solid block). Nicely done work. Who would have thought that the first Terminator would be made of concrete?
While stumbling about to absorb as much as possible of consumer AR, I found some related stuff, some new, some "old", all of it augmented. Let's start with the new: The Future is Wild, originally a British tv series for Animal Planet, chronicling speculative anthroplogies/ zoologies of the future.. I've seen the show, and enjoyed it. What I hadn't seen was the AR that has sprung up since.. Augmented reality for education, in the form of a 'living book" and t-shirt.
And the futuroscope theme park, attraction: "Les Animaux du Futur" (this is in 2008 ):
The below video is from Takehiro Tawara, a Ph.D. in computer science,with a background in computer visualization, using AR to conduct wave simulation.
I know this is for research, but my thought was "wow, that would be an awesomely soothing cubicle toy!"
Beats the heck out of a stress ball, I think.
And check out his video for Interactive Volume Segemntation, it strikes me as "MRI analysis of the future":
This is your brain. This is your brain on AR. Any questions?
