Month: June 2021

The makers of arguably the two most important mobile AR apps, Niantic and Snap, both had good news this week, with the former preparing to replicate its success with Pokémon GO for another franchise and the latter notching another popular augmented reality Lens for Snapchat. Meanwhile, leaders of two of the top companies vying to take on consumer-grade AR wearables (Apple and Facebook) tipped their hands ever so slightly this week. In other news, Tencent continues in its role of investing in the AR ecosystem and Looking Glass is showing the world a different take on immersive experiences… more

Ever since Facebook announced its partnership with Luxxotica brand Ray-Ban to produce smartglasses, the augmented reality space has been on high alert awaiting more details. Unfortunately, those details have been scarce, until now. During a session at the Paris Viva Technology conference, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg offers a bit more detail on what the company has planned. • Don’t Miss: Why the Nightmare Scenario of Facebook’s Quest VR Advertisements Is Actually a Win, & Will Ultimately Boost AR The Zuckerberg session followed the opening chat from Apple CEO Tim Cook earlier this week… more

The recent announcement that Facebook will begin inserting advertisements into its VR experience on its Oculus Quest headset has set the VR and augmented reality industry into a frenzy. At first glance, the first thing many will point to is the recent history of Facebook and its somewhat rocky path regarding political and social issue ads. And while the company is still working on much-needed fixes, immediately writing off advertisements in VR (and later, augmented reality) as problematic may be an overreaction. Let’s unpack why. • Don’t Miss: Facebook Develops AI That Can Copy Typefaces… more

Over the past decade, China tech giant Tencent has invested in several companies with varying roles in the augmented reality industry. Its latest bet backs a startup with some short-term impact related to the COVID-19 pandemic but more future-focused growth potential in the coming AR smartglasses era. Don’t Miss: Ultraleap Improves Tracking of Two-Handed Interactions with Gemini Software Update According to a Sky News report, Image Frame Investment, Tencent’s venture capital arm, will invest approximately $50 million into UK-based Ultraleap as part of the company’s on-going Series D round… more

For awhile now, Google has offered the ability to translate text through smartphone cameras via Google Translate and Google Lens, with Apple bringing similar technology to iPhones via Live Text.Hold our beers, say AI researchers at Facebook, who have now developed computer vision technology that can handle real-time text translation and then some in augmented reality.Don’t Miss: Facebook Chief Mark Zuckerberg Talks Immersive Remote Video & AR Smartglasses Following Major Reveals from Snap & GoogleThis week, Praveen Krishnan, a postdoctoral researcher for Facebook, and Tal Hassner, research scientist, published research detailing an unsupervised AI model called TextStyleBrush that can view a single typed or handwritten word via a smartphone camera, emulate its typeface, and then virtually replace the original text with another word in the camera view.Facebook”It works similar to the way style brush tools work in word processors, but for text aesthetics in images. It surpasses…more

The Apple rumor mill never stops churning and when it comes to augmented reality smartglasses, the chatter has been particularly hot in recent months. Now Apple CEO Tim Cook has made a new appearance where he makes a few comments that may stoke even more excitement for what’s coming next in that direction. • Don’t Miss: Apple AR Smartglasses Concept Shows the Virtual Desktop of the Future The comments from Cook were made on Wednesday during the Paris, France tech conference Viva Technology. During a remote conversation with Guillaume Lacroix, the CEO of Brut, Cook decided to talk about what… more

Not all Kickstarters are created equal. Some take forever to get their products to supporters, and when the product does arrive (usually much later than promised) it’s often very rough around the edges. I’m here today to report that the exact opposite is the case with the Looking Glass Portrait holographic display, which ultimately raised over $2.5 million for its crowdfunding effort. Not only did the device come around the time it was promised, but the packaging and fit and finish are so well done that I felt it deserved the full unboxing treatment. • Don’t Miss: Looking Glass Responds to… more

With the tagline “More Than Meets the Eye,” the Transformers franchise was pretty much preordained to have its own augmented reality game, and AR gaming pioneer Niantic has stepped up to fulfill that destiny.Niantic will now join forces with toymakers Hasbro and Tomy and development studio Very Very Games to build Transformers: Heavy Metal on its Lightship AR cloud platform.Don’t Miss: Niantic Bringing Buddy Interactions to AR+ Mode in Pokémon GO, Shared Experiences with Other Trainers to FollowBased on images of gameplay provided by Niantic, Transformers: Heavy Metal follows the formula of location-based mobile AR centered on exploring real-world locations, collecting virtual characters and resources, and taking part in turn-based battles.The game is slated for a soft launch “soon” with a global launch before the end of the year. The game already has a website where interested players can sign-up for updates.NianticNiantic”In thinking about franchises that would be incredible to…more

For its latest augmented reality trick, Snapchat has brought the world an AR Lens that has become a bit of a viral hit on Twitter as users turn themselves and their favorite movie stars into characters out of a Pixar movie. According to a Snap spokesperson, more than 215 million Snapchat users have interacted with the Cartoon 3D Style Lens since its launch on June 10. The Lens has tallied more than 1.7 billion views over that period. Don’t Miss: AR Snapshots: Celebrate Pride Month with These Snapchat Augmented Reality Lenses With the Cartoon 3D Style Lens, Snapchat can remix photos taken… more

Over the past few weeks, Google, Snap, and Facebook have all taken their turns to show off their new augmented reality technologies. This week, it was Apple’s turn, with new AR features for iOS 15 along with new capabilities for developers. Meanwhile, Facebook’s plans to launch a smartwatch in order to circumvent the dominance of Apple and Google over the mobile ecosystem leaked this week, and those plans include a future symbiotic relationship with its forthcoming smartglasses. Also, Snap shared a new AR experience developed via Lens Studio for its next-generation Spectacles smartglasses… more