Fanta Virtual Tennis on YouTube
No doubt about it, augmented reality is one thing that's on virtually everybody's lips right now. That has been noted here on ThreeMinds earlier, and YouTube is bursting with clips showing examples of basic AR applications, both mobile and desktop. But so far most of those examples are either of the really simple type, or conceptual plays of what is not quite yet happening, but could be reality in the future.
Some smart(er) applications are starting to pop up though, and I suspect the pace of that will soon dramatically increase. One such example is the Virtual Tennis game, a mobile AR application for Fanta. To play the game, users need to first go to the site, download the game, print the Virtual Tennis Court, and then get a friend to do the same. Once two people have the app and the Court, one of them can act as "server" to set up a new game, and the other can join as player. The printed Virtual Court turns into a "real" tennis court and ball on the mobile screen, of course. At the moment, the game works only on the various versions of Nokia's N81, N82, N95, 6120 and 6121 smartphones, because, according to other blog posts about the game, it needs "a high-res camera and a high-speed processor to run correctly." Which makes sense at least in terms of the camera - those phones sport better cams than the iPhone, for example.
Another idea, with perhaps limited uses but still an interesting connection to an existing, popular service, is this: PaperTweet3D. It's a barcode that encodes your Twitter username on a shirt and then uses AR to automically overlay your latest tweet on the shirt. This could be fun at conferences?
But to me, Lego's Digital Box Kiosk (which was already noted in a Threeminds post earlier) still beats both virtual tennis and tweet shirts. The Kiosks made of a camera and a screen will let curious Lego-builders see what they can build from the pieces that come in the box. Watch the video on YouTube for a better idea. Seeing is believing, right?
Karri Ojanen
No doubt about it, augmented reality is one thing that's on virtually everybody's lips right now. That has been noted here on ThreeMinds earlier, and YouTube is bursting with clips showing examples of basic AR applications, both mobile and desktop. But so far most of those examples are either of the really simple type, or conceptual plays of what is not quite yet happening, but could be reality in the future.
Some smart(er) applications are starting to pop up though, and I suspect the pace of that will soon dramatically increase. One such example is the Virtual Tennis game, a mobile AR application for Fanta. To play the game, users need to first go to the site, download the game, print the Virtual Tennis Court, and then get a friend to do the same. Once two people have the app and the Court, one of them can act as "server" to set up a new game, and the other can join as player. The printed Virtual Court turns into a "real" tennis court and ball on the mobile screen, of course. At the moment, the game works only on the various versions of Nokia's N81, N82, N95, 6120 and 6121 smartphones, because, according to other blog posts about the game, it needs "a high-res camera and a high-speed processor to run correctly." Which makes sense at least in terms of the camera - those phones sport better cams than the iPhone, for example.
Another idea, with perhaps limited uses but still an interesting connection to an existing, popular service, is this: PaperTweet3D. It's a barcode that encodes your Twitter username on a shirt and then uses AR to automically overlay your latest tweet on the shirt. This could be fun at conferences?
But to me, Lego's Digital Box Kiosk (which was already noted in a Threeminds post earlier) still beats both virtual tennis and tweet shirts. The Kiosks made of a camera and a screen will let curious Lego-builders see what they can build from the pieces that come in the box. Watch the video on YouTube for a better idea. Seeing is believing, right?
Karri Ojanen
Strategists & Planners
Comments (1)
Ar sure is getting to be all over me. Last week I bought a new laptop and I can log on just by looking at it! Also it does simple operations by me talking to it. If someone else tries, no go for them. Too cool! I want to get me one of those Twitter shirts!
Cheers,
Kris Olin
Web Designer | Social Media Marketer
http://twitter.com/krisolin
Posted on June 11, 2009 19:51