Augmented Reality is 3D Advertising (With Five Videos)

An Introduction To Augmented Reality

While we’ve talked extensively about QR Codes, there is also the matter of AR, otherwise known as Augmented Reality.

Remember that QR Codes and Augmented Reality always need “a marketing medium” to play off such as print, product or video.

Like QR Codes which were first released as open-source in 1994 by Denso-Wave, a subsidiary of Toyota, AR has been present for years, making famous appearances in the 1977-1983 triology Star Wars in the form of a tape-recorded holographic message emitted by R2-D2. The augmented reality in that particular example resembled aging Jedi Master Obi-Wan- a form of communication through Luke Skywalker’s droid.

That type of augmented reality was visible to the naked eye.

Remember, you didn’t have to wear any 3D glasses to see that example of augmented reality, which has become a recent phenomenon at the movies these days, where objects stick out at you and most famously in the classic virtual world movie Avatar in 2010 and a handful of other movies that followed.

That type of augmented reality was invisible to the naked eye.

Since you don’t always want to be reaching for the 3D glasses, we thought we’d explain another way you can access virtual 3D through QR-based augmented reality tags. With over 60 kinds of digital barcodes out there, it’s probably best if we stick to the ubitquous QR Code.

Daqri allows us to do just that, creating North America’s first bridged QR-AR platform set to be released in the coming weeks:

It’s certainly becoming interesting what exactly could be hidden behind those “call-to-action” codes!

Examples of Augmented Reality in Advertising

More Sophisticated Examples of Augmented Reality

We also briefly touched upon the fact that IBM had developed Layar, the world’s first augmented reality browser.

Layar recently released their platform to Apple where mobile app developers can now integrate the AR browser.

To give you perspective, this leads to more sophisticated examples of browser-enabled AR. In pop culture there is Gene Roddenberry’s Star Trek: The Next Generation’s holodeck where crew members spend their leisure time in a simulated program, The Matrix where Keanu Reeves and others fight to win in a virtual world, and most recently the movie Inception where Lenardo DiCaprio builds multiple layers to his dreams.

Silicon Valley Startup VuFind also came out with a virtual world interface where social networking goes visual!

Augmented Reality Firm Total Immersion is one of the largest players in the field and just recieved 5.5 million dollars in funding.

Check out their cool video from a conference in June last year:

Dan Verhaeghe is the Marketing Specialist and New Media Expert at McLoughlin Promotions. You can reach him at [email protected] or at 905-238-8973 ext. 233.