Research: Augmented Reality

Shown below are some you tube videos showing the functionality of Augmented Reality.



Total Immersion - Demo 2007 - Website



Beyond Tomorrow Show: Augmented Reality



Beyond Tomorrow Shown: Augmented Reality GPS Tour

The portfolio website of Pablo Valbuena : his work deals with the idea of augmented reality, and plays with viewers perceptions of what is real. Pablo Valbuena website

Research: Contact Lens Displays

Below is an excerpt from a website detailing a new contact lens digital display and some of the possibilities it may have for the future. This is very interesting because if developed further it will revolutionise many areas. Screen size in mobile devices will no longer be an issue. Gaming will be transformed as we will see the birth of the first immersive environments. Augmented Reality systems will also become a main stream technology. This contact lens technology will also have the capacity to provide round the clock health checks through bio-censors placed on them. These are just some of the areas covered n the article, read on for the rest…

The University of Washington has used microscopic scale manufacturing techniques to combine a flexible contact lens with an imprinted electronic circuit and lights. Though in its infancy, the combination of a wearable contact lens with embedded optoelectronic and electronic devices promises many things, most notably this could well be the beginning of the Computer Human Interface of the future.

Accordingly, the University of Washington, there contact lens offers the promise of a viable large screen display alternative for connecting users with various mobile devices. Project head and Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering Babak Parviz envisages that his team’s electronic contact lens will offer the ability to superimpose a transparent high resolution display over the field of vision of one, maybe both eyes of the wearer.

"Looking through a completed lens, you would see what the display is generating superimposed on the world outside," says Parviz.

Apart from the expectation of eventually offering a large screen display for our wearable and micro computers, PDAs and phones, the heads-up aspect of the contact lens leaves the way open for a democratization of Augmented Reality.
Unlike Virtual Reality, where the user's field of view is completely replaced with an artificial visual environment, Augmented Reality uses head tracking in conjunction with augmented vision to overlay complimentary information on the user's view.

The system can tell which direction the user is looking and adjusts the displayed image accordingly, displaying new and appropriate information for the scene being viewed.

If these tools were readily available and in mass usage, a plethora of new applications for augmented reality would almost certainly come to light.
Video-game companies could use the contact lens to completely immerse players in a virtual world without restricting their range of motion. In Communications, people on the go could surf the Internet on a display screen that only they would be able to see.

One of the aspects of the UW Contact Lens most likely to capture the imagination of the public is its promise of bionic vision. “Using nanotechnology you can extend the sophistication of the contact lens as far as you like,” says Parviz. “There is interest in including cameras on the contact lens and incorporating other lenses so that, for example, if you were looking at something very small, you would be able to zoom in to get a closer look. Similarly, if something is far away, you would be able to zoom in.”

With an array of lenses wirelessly connected to a wearable computer, there’s obviously the capability of “recording images”. The possibilities are almost endless once someone is wearing such a contact lens. With the ability to record everything we see, which the UW Contact lens will ultimately enable, the concept of privacy, instant recall and a whole host of new capabilities come into play. A decade from now, recording everything we say and do is now a distinct possibility.
Bio-sensing and a wearable health monitoring system.

Perhaps the most left-field aspect to the UW study is the promise of a wearable health monitoring system. “The second big area that we are looking at is bio-sensing, because on the surface of the contact lens there are a lot of biomarkers already present that are important for monitoring health care,” explains Parviz.
“We recognized that if we could have a contact lens that incorporated biosensors that could sample the biology of the eye we could constantly report it outside, and hence have a non-invasive way of putting people on continuous health monitoring.”
What’s more, the system also has the capability of displaying the key indicators in real time to the wearer.

To view the entire article click here

Brief: Design Futures

From first looking at the brief I was somewhat intimidated by it. This was mostly to do with the fact that I only read through the first two paragraphs, which went straight over my head, before I disregarded it. However after reading through it a few times and discussing it during our lectures. I think the brief itself is not as bad as I first taught.

To start, I have begun researching various technological websites. Investigating existing/upcoming technology as I feel I have limited knowledge in this area. I am also researching past advances as I feel “you need to know where something has been to know where it is going”. While researching I have also started brainstorming possible future concepts.

Yesterday I chatted with Mìcheal and guest lecturer Sam Butler. We discussed the various ideas I had generated. This for me was very helpful as I got some feedback on how promising each idea was and possible problems regarding each. I was also told to deliberate on the other side of a technology, which is its meaning. The reason being the majority of my ideas were based totally on the technological side which was limiting the possibility of growth. Thinking about the meaning behind a technology would result in a much richer and original concept. I was also asked to think about the social aspect of technology.

From revising my list of ideas and thinking about my earlier conversion with Mìcheal. I decided the concept which had the most substance and originality was the virtual reality contact lenses. This was echoed by another guest lecturer Mike Blow who I chatted with yesterday evening. One use for these lenses, besides the obvious use in computer games (completely immersive 3D enviornemts), could be in the emergency sector by using Augmented Reality. Firefighters, for example, could wear these lenses entering a burning building. The lens would then have a 3Dimensional map of the buildings interior displayed on top of what the firefighter would already see through his own vision. In a sense the firefighter would then be able to see in the dark, through smoke etc. Another use would be in the Medical area, where doctors could practice highly challenging operations. With these lenses a doctor could work on virtual patients to develop there skills. One problem with this example however would be some sort of virtual gloves would have to be invented as well.

Some of the advice that Mike Blow gave me during our conversion regarding this concept was to:

• Look into what has been done already technology wise with virtual reality lenses.
• What stage the research is at now and where is it about to go.
• Think more about the various uses this concept could have, which may lead to a very original/interesting outcome?
• Think about why the Virtual Reality Goggles didn’t take off - versus - Why these new lenses will?

Brighton Photo Biennial 08’ - University of Brighton Gallery - “Iraq through the lens of Vietnam”

This exhibition compares the Vietnam war and the ongoing Iraq war through photographs from both sides in both wars. Some of which have rarely been seen in the west.

The first impression I got from walking around the exhibition was how real everything felt. Regarding the Vietnam photographs, although I knew that this war occurred from reading about it and watching the movies. It still felt slightly fictional in my mind.By viewing these, in some cases horrific photographs, somehow it really hit home that this wasn’t fictional at all, but was a major historical event. I think the reason for this was the photographs, in my view, portray the human aspect much better than movies or to a lesser extent books. As these are the actual people involved in the war looking back at you.

With that said, the side of the exhibition I was most interested in was the photographs from Iraq. As this is a war I have lived through and still ongoing and one where my views have not been influenced by any movie.

I firstly began looking at the photographs from Guantanamo Bay where the Iraqi detainees were tortured and humiliated by U.S troops. This was a major interest because I had just recently finished a book by the well known journalist Jon Ronson called “The Men who Star at Goats”. In it he depicts some of these incidents of torture and humiliation. One torture technique which was heavily covered in the book was torture through the use of sound. This torture was where a detainee would be hooded, put into a metal container, and then blasted with a single music track playing in a loop for up to 12 hours. In some cases the U.S troops used the Barney the Dinosaur theme tune in others it was Metallica “Enter Sandman”. It was hard to conclude if any of the photography on show depicted this torture.

The next part of the exhibition I stumbled upon was the propaganda element of the ongoing war. Here two large walls were covered with various small photographs. The first had a lot of smiling Iraqi’s, mostly children, in various situations with U.S troops. These images been released to the press.The second wall was full of photographs, again small, taken by Iraqi civilians on mobile phones and other digital media devices. These horrific images show the truth of what really is going on.

When the leaving the exhibition I though that although both wars were very similar in stature. There were two major differences:

The first was the difference in how each war was reported. In Vietnam for instance Photographic Journalists were free to do and go wherever there liked. These journalists were called unilateral’s. Regarding the Iraq war journalist are embedded in a particular U.S troop, where photographing dead soldiers is forbidden. Thus shielding the press to what the U.S army feels the public should see.
The second major difference was the level of respect between the U.S army and there advisories. During the Vietnam War the U.S troops although hating there enemy they still felt a respect for them and the “fighting spirit”. This respect seems to have vanished with regard to the Iraq War. Here U.S troops have decided that it is ok to humiliate the Iraqi’s where possible.

This for me is a very worrying part of the ongoing War…