augmented.org

Hi there,

I’ve been traveling a lot lately, so I will catch up on the latest news quickly. Expect a bigger post on the hottest tracking system I’ve seen yesterday, to be found here soon. :-)

Android from HITLab

The HIT Lab, mother of all AR toolkits, has started a new project on Augmented Reality brought to the Android platform, too. Android AR The platform supports in-situ 3D geolocated visualization. They mostly aim on the 3D quality part and cooperate with the IPCITY project. Expect more from those guys to come soon. They state:

We are directing our research on extending the quality of the platform (shadows, animation) and the development of advanced user interaction techniques. In the meantime, we are now developing different proof-of-concept applications based on collaborative mixed reality scenarios.

LinceoVR with AR

The VR software solution from Italy, LinceoVR, released their free viewer LinceoVR 4 ALL. It also comes with their Augmented Reality module, so now you can grab a demo scene file (or generate one with the trial of the full software) to see it in AR quickly. They claim to have full integration of their raytracer into the AR module, but I have to get back to you and report on this one, once I’ve seen it myself. The binaries rest on my machine for quiet a while now. Darn! If you have experience with their RayTracer and AR module, let us know in the comments, please!

Heavy Rain

Thomas put together an overview of the parts of the new grown-up gaming experience Heavy Rain, where you can see the AR technology, I mentioned before.

Webcam educational

Giuseppe Masciopinto and his team has built webcam education and rehabilitation tool. Giuseppe is a teacher for the handicaped and sees the need and advantage of webcam based learning. See his site:
webcamgame.jimdo.com/home-english/ There will a conference and a demo of the work on May, 14th. More infos to be found in this PDF.

Magic Book

Another nice Magic Book demo called DigiLog comes from the GIST:

The press release is out for a few days already, but I think now it’s the best time to share the news with you - because Peter (CTO of metaio) is sharing his fresh impressions on junaio 2.0 in a cold, but sunny Munich in a new video.

If you happen to be living under a rock, here a short abstract on what junaio is:

junaio is a mobile augmented reality platform that allows users and developers the ability to create content channels in the real world. Users can flip through channels like entertainment, nightlife, travel and many others and see information digitally displayed around by simply pointing their phone. With junaio’s open API, developers can create state of the art augmented reality applications.

The most important two things: there is an open API to add content or logic, e.g. for your own AR location based games, etc. plus there is an indoor alternative for bad signal GPS: metaio calls it LLA-markers that encode your lat/long position plus height. Let me quote again:

One feature which makes junaio 2.0 outstanding is the possibility to use it indoors. By combining the GPS- and compass-based geo-information with the so called LLA-marker-technology (patent pending) users now can experience augmented reality not only in the world outside but even within buildings. This feature can be used e.g. for museums where visitors can point their camera on the info next to the exhibits and gather information directly on their mobile phone.

It’s a great concept to overwrite and lock your (missing) GPS signal by a scanned marker. Peter? Is it possible to use it through all Apps on the phone? :-) On Android it could be a module, to be reused by other apps. Hmm. Anyway, enough! Now for the video:

Peter and Frank give a nice teaser at the end (Damn you, cliffhanger!): seems they might soon release their android version of junaio, that actually allows video-based tracking (already implementing the markerless approach, that was presented at metaio’s last fair in October 2009).

I’m curious. :-)

Since gamer tend to be on the look-out for the hottest and most CPU consuming software and hardware, it’s obvious that Augmented Reality is featured at the game developer conference in San Francisco this year.

The below videos gives a quick overview of the GDC, including PlayStation Move (the Sony Wiimote), the well known AR pet (looks really good), a multitouch by FishTish, Autodesk real-time motion capture, the AR flying saucer (with observer camera), Project Natal and more. For a full coverage it’s probably best to refer to Ori who was reporting live from GDC on his site.

Enjoy!

Ciao to Bella Italia!

A problem all AR and VR systems suffer is the one of haptics. You just can’t touch the virtual world! While you can touch a screen, a marker or a joystick, you still won’t be able to touch the simulated objects. Force feedback is bulky and not as accurate as the real world’s friction or collision. Also you will have trouble of occlusions: is your hand behind the virtual stuff or in front of? The illusion breaks fast with wrong occlusion rendering - and of course - when missing physical feedback.

At RTT AG, I also run into these AR-scenarios where an augmentation is just not enough. If we simulate something the user wants to hold in his or her hand we will use a chroma keying to overlay a colored 3D print rapid prototype that replicates the virtual object’s shape. Now you can actually grab the object and still see your hand on top of it while enclosing it with your fingers.

Of course, we are limited to have a virtual object similar shaped to the 3D print, but it’s a great workflow with realistic haptic feedback. We also integrated push buttons, where your fingers may trigger virtual keystrokes.

One of our partner universities, the Politecnico Milano in Italy and their KAEMaRT group (Knowledge Aided Engineering, Manufacturing and Related Technologies) by Professor Umberto Cugini have been working on extending our module to support even more feedback. Their engineers work on programmable hardware buttons, sliders and nobs, that can communicate with the virtual world: the rendering of the virtual buttons will be updated accordingly to the real world’s buttons. But more - the most important feature: you can set the behavior of the buttons through the software… how hard is it to pull the slider? How many clicks does the wheel have? So it can influence in both directions between real and virtual.

In the following video you can see their great work on haptics simulations combined with our Augmented Reality module RTT RealView and our real-time chroma keying. We believe, this is the way to go for product prototypes, haptics research and user tests.

Maybe you are sick of iPhone or android augmentations for the moment? I can definitely relate, since they are eating up your battery and it not yet socially accepted to scan your RL chat buddy with your smartphone all the time. ;-) With HMDs out of consumer reach for the time being, there has always been an alternative to weak portable devices or glasses: projected augmented reality - or spatial augmented reality (SAR). Like Oliver Bimber I’m a big fan of this approach, since it really augments your real life objects without the need of special glasses, an extra screen to look up to or any kind of handheld device. The augmentation really appears where it should be: on top of the real furniture, etc.

I’ve posted a couple of examples before (e.g. on animating buildings or the augmented GO game (posted on augmented.org’s facebook page last friday)), but here again is another great example of how to enhance a given existing scenario nicely with AR.

Samuel Jordan and Michael Greenspan from Queen’s U did a project on spatial AR showing a neat AR pool assist.

Of course this is another use case than a location based approach of the mobile devices. But I always enjoy these projector approaches, for the simplicity and the non-visibility of technology. In a controlled environment it is easy to augment - even without a marker in front of a webcam. So, if you play pool not often enough to remember the physics or rules, this could help you out a lot… but then again it’s just theory and hopefully the cushions work well to get the angle right.

I’d love to collect some more projects that are heading this direction of SAR. So, if you have something up your sleeve (or your University Lab) please let us know in the comments or by mail! I’d love to compile an overview of good spatial AR 2010 for you guys! :-)