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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

Magic Leap has had a rough couple of years, highlighted by high-profile executive departures, lawsuits, troublesome patent shuffles, and massive layoffs. Despite this, things seem to have calmed down at the augmented reality startup under Peggy Johnson, but there are still questions as to how things went awry under the old regime. • Don’t Miss: Magic Leap Experiencing Yet Another Major Executive Shake-Up, Report Says Most former Magic Leap staff have remained tight-lipped, but now one major former executive is finally shedding some light on the situation. Magic Leap’s former senior vice… more

Mobile augmented reality for iOS typically comes through apps via ARKit, but Apple is borrowing a few pages from Google’s playbook and bringing AR directly to iOS 15.During the keynote presentation at the WWDC 2021, Craig Federighi, senior vice president of software engineering for Apple, unveiled Live Text, a new camera mode coming to iOS 15 that delivers much of the same functionality that Google Lens offers for Android smartphones and Google Photos.Don’t Miss: Apple’s AR Spaces in Updated Clips App Uses iPhone & iPad LiDAR to Give You New AR Video PowersLive Text will enable iPhone users to point their capture photos and interact with text. In addition to copying text, users can search based on selected text or call a phone number recognized within the image. The same functionality will be available via the Photos app on iOS and macOS Monterey. Live Text also replicates Google Lens’s ability to recognize pet breeds, plants, products, art, and landmarks.Apple/YouTubeApple/YouTubeIn…more

While Apple introduced new AR features for iOS 15 and Object Capture for Reality Kit 2 during the WWDC 2021 keynote, updates for ARKit were curiously absent in the official presentation.That doesn’t mean there isn’t anything new coming to Apple’s toolkit for mobile AR apps, and the next update helps evolve AR experiences via ARKit towards the sci-fi dream of the Metaverse, also known as the AR cloud.Don’t Miss: Snap Releases Lens Studio 4.0 with 3D Body Mesh & More, Upgrades Scan as Fashion AssistantThe headlining feature for ARKit 5 is Location Anchors, an expansion of the persistent content functionality introduced in ARKit 2, which enables apps to execute AR experiences at precise locations in real-world locations, from famous landmarks to friendly neighborhoods, based on latitude, longitude, and altitude coordinates.AppleHowever, Location Anchors will be limited to London, New York, and other select US cities at launch. You’ll also need an iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, iPhone XR, or…more

The debut of the augmented reality version of Snap’s Spectacles came with several examples of how the wearable can allow creators to transform the world around them. Now, weeks after the initial launch of the AR smartglasses, we’re getting yet another example of how the device can facilitate new kinds of immersive experiences. • Don’t Miss: How to Get a Pair of Snap’s New Spectacles AR Smartglasses Los Angeles-based technical designer Katherine Harris managed to snag a pair of Spectacles and decided to use the device to develop a new kind of teaching tool. Harris, a veteran of Microsoft… more

Just when everything seemed settled over at Magic Leap, it turns out that the internal tumult is still in play. Now, just as newly minted CEO Peggy Johnson has managed to fully position herself publicly as the new leader of the struggling augmented reality startup, more executive departures have begun. • Don’t Miss: Magic Leap Made Me Cry, Probably for the Last Time. Here’s Why That’s the Good News Magic Leap’s chief operating officer Henk Vlietstra, chief patent officer David Lundmark, and chief technology officer Paul Greco are all exiting the company according to a report from Business… more