Do you suffer from any of these symptoms?
- Thinking that augmented reality (AR) is a fad with no practical application
- Thinking that AR is for kids and gamers only, not for solving real-world business problems
- Thinking “What’s AR?”
Do you suffer from any of these symptoms?
As you’ve probably gathered by reading this blog, we’re really excited about the future of augmented reality (AR) technology. That’s especially true now that the two biggest mobile ecosystems, iOS and Android, have development kits (ARKit and ARCore, respectively) that enable developers to bring AR apps to the mass market, without having to fuss around learning the science behind AR.
We talk a lot about virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) here at AndPlus, not only in this blog but also amongst ourselves and with our clients. These two related technologies are poised to spur some truly innovative, useful applications—and not just in the gaming and entertainment worlds.
In the last couple of years, if you were asked to list the top augmented reality/virtual reality (AR/VR) development companies, the list would have included names such as Google and Oculus, but probably not Apple. But with the recent release of ARKit in iOS 11, Apple is shrewdly making a bid to establish itself as a player in the AR space.
Two remarkable developments in the last year represented the brilliant (or unholy, depending on your perspective) union of two inexorable trends: mobile apps and virtual/augmented reality (VR/AR). One was the release of the insanely popular Pokémon Go smartphone app, which brought augmented reality to cartoon character hunters of all ages. The other was Google Cardboard and the virtual reality content that can be played on it, giving anyone with a few bucks, a smartphone, and some free time a taste of the virtual reality experience.
For as long as most of us can remember, we have interacted with our computers via some variation on the theme of the graphical user interface (GUI), keyboard, and pointing device. The advent of touch-sensitive displays, and their popularization via smartphones and tablets was not really a radical departure. It eliminated the mouse and clumsy stylus sure, but there seems to be obvious missing piece.
All of that may change sooner than you think. Augmented reality and virtual reality are rising in popularity as the tech continues to advance.
