Augmented Reality Response

On Monday, our class had the privilege of Skyping with Whurley from Chaotic Moon Studios, which is the leading company in mobile applications. Whurley is a very entertaining and intelligent man who took an unfamiliar and almost confusing concept for me and made AR seem a lot cooler than I originally thought it was.

In our Skype discussion, Whurley talked about AR being used for many different reasons including gaming, advertising, and the military. It’s funny because I keep saying I am interested in interactive advertising, but I really haven’t done much exploring into the field. Well, AR is a great example of how to create interactive advertising. Whurley showed us a video of how car companies (such as Volkswagon and Toyota) are creating augmented reality advertisements. Volkswagon’s AR ad was especially cool because it allowed users to interact with the car from a within the magazine ad. Consumers could use their smart phones to view the AR ad and interactive with moving and even opening the augmented car door’s.

Both Derek and Whurley showed us this youtube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNu4CluFOcw, which really put AR into perspective for me. In order for something to be considered AR, there must be some aspect of reality included. This video game experiments with using a printed off map (on a piece of paper) and a smart phone to play a zombie shooting game. The coolest part about the game, you ask? Real live skittles can be used as bombs in the virtual game!

So, to answer my question: Are all AR’s considered virtual worlds, video games or digital environments? What differentiates AR from what we’ve studied thus far? As previously mentioned what differentiates AR from virtual worlds and video games is the inclusion of reality. Some video games and virtual worlds can definitely be considered AR. But of course, not all video games can be considered AR. Kinect is a great example of an AR video game, as well as the video posted above. I suppose all AR has elements of virtual worlds as they are obviously augmented by virtual technology.

Are there examples of augmented realities that are not virtual worlds or video games? Well, to answer this, Whurley also talked about how Chaotic Moon is using AR by creating mobile applications. For example, we talked about the AP Drone, which is a mini helicopter that can be flown through a real room using an iPhone app. It seems pretty damn cool! Another example of how AR can be more than just video games (besides advertising) would be the militaries use of AR.AR is definitely an up and coming technology that I believe will be used in many different fields.