Reality++: A Look into Augmented Reality
By Aaron Ong
In several science fiction works, holography is a commonly featured technology. A hologram, for those uninitiated time-travelling ruffians, is a 3D virtual projection of some entity in our very own world. Such witchcraft! A whole gamut of works includes some form of it, from the Mass Effect series to Star Wars and its numerous prequels and sequels. In real life, however, holograms aren’t as commonplace. Well, it’s either that or I haven’t been going to the right places, in which case I’d like to be informed of such technologically advanced localities. However, there was that recent concert with the Tupac “hologram”, which, sorry to disappoint, was actually just a 2D projection on a glass plane. Apart from that concert, breakthroughs in holography don’t seem to be significant enough to be featured on the mainstream news that often.
Which ones are real, and which one is the pretender?
That’s right: Miranda Lawson is genetically engineered,
which means she’s a soulless heathen.
Holography is just one of the many forms of augmented reality (AR). Generally speaking, a piece of technology is said to incorporate AR if it overlays virtual elements on our own physical reality. It’s not as impressive as it sounds, because something as mundane as a photo booth application that lets you view yourself with cartoon sunglasses counts as AR. Of course, there are more exciting applications, which I’ll be discussing later on.
A survey by D.W.F. van Krevelen and R. Poelman gives a comprehensive overview of AR throughout the years. It’s a dense academic journal though, so I’ll summarize some of its parts for you. They state that the first AR prototype was developed in the 1960’s by a computer graphics engineer named Ivan Sutherland, along with his students. The term “augmented reality” was only coined during the 1990’s by scientists named Caudell and Mizell. There are several technologies that allow the implementation of AR, such as video see-throughs (virtual elements are overlaid on a video feed), optical see-throughs (virtual elements are overlaid through mirrors or lenses—think visors), and projective displays (virtual elements are overlaid on the physical plane itself, like holograms). AR isn’t limited to just visual displays though, because interfaces such as visual user interfaces, gesture recognition, and speech recognition also count as AR.
Of course, not everything that has to do with virtual witchcraft is AR. Virtual reality doesn’t count; it’s fully virtual and detached from our own reality. There’s also an “augmented virtuality”, which is more of an inversion of AR; it involves the superimposition of real elements on a virtual space. There’s actually a reality-virtuality continuum, and AR is a lot closer to reality than the two previously mentioned concepts. Thus, should your mind start to degenerate with AR, you’d still be at least somewhat in touch with reality.
What modern AR technology can you think of? If you screamed “Google Glass” at your monitor, I’d like to ask you to stop using your telepathy on me. Anyway, yes, Google Glass ties together several AR features, such as superimposing virtual images through the use of a head visor, and voice-activated commands. Most, if not all of its features are rooted in the AR concept, placing an extra layer on top of your boring old reality. Should you ever use one of these things, however, I’d like to remind you to use these judiciously, because reality is very much capable of killing you while you’re too distracted with the virtual part.
“I don’t even know this kid. But hey, let’s snap a pic as I’m spinning him around, Glass.”
Another piece of modern AR technology is the Intel Perceptual Computing Kit, which is actually what my thesis partners and I are using for our thesis right now. It’s an SDK (software development kit) that allows developers to harness some AR features in their software. The kit makes use of a special camera to implement gesture recognition, finger tracking, voice recognition, and facial tracking. The kit’s website showcases some of its demos, such as the ridiculously adorable Kung Pow Kevin. The SDK itself includes a demo of Augmented Farm, an interactive storybook that lets the users see a 3D model of a farm that’s superimposed on a video feed of them. By flashing a certain printed image to the camera, the 3D farm model “attaches” itself to the paper, letting the user manipulate the view through a real world item. Back in the day, such amazing technology would cause its pioneers to be burned at the stake; but fear not, time travelers, for such wonders aren’t a travesty against the Lord Himself.
(As a side note, the Ateneo Laboratory for the Learning Sciences has two of these special cameras for the Intel Perceptual Computing SDK. Interested parties may contact Ma’am Didith Rodrigo for the use of a camera in developing applications, possibly for one’s very own thesis.)
The user is presented with a 3D model of the farm. Image is taken from Augmented Farm’s documentation.
While I’m no expert on AR, I can say that its recent developments look quite promising. AR has been around for quite a while, but the concept remains unfamiliar to the general populace because of limited consumer products that truly harness its potential. Emerging technologies such as the Intel Perceptual Kit and Google Glass are potential game changers however, making advanced AR applications more accessible to everyday people. Just make sure to be careful with these powerful tools, because we wouldn’t want those superimposed virtual elements to start a trend of self-fulfilling Darwinistic deaths.
Image sources:
http://www.dvdactive.com/images/editorial/screenshot/2009/8/spirits1983.jpg
http://images.thesource.com.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/tupac_1.jpg
http://static.ddmcdn.com/gif/blogs/dnews-files-2013-02-GoogleGlass-660-jpg.jpg
Information sources:
http://kjcomps.6te.net/upload/paper1%20.pdf
http://www.google.com/glass/start/what-it-does/
http://software.intel.com/en-us/vcsource/tools/perceptual-computing-sdk
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