Everything Else
News: How Amazon's Echo Frames Point the Way to Our Augmented Reality Smartglasses Future
Part of the mainstreaming of augmented reality is learning to adopt new habits around the hardware delivering these groundbreaking next-gen interface experiences.
Market Reality: Olympics AR Content on Instagram & Google, Facebook's Metaverse, & Snapchat's Magic Karaoke
Over the past week, practically every major tech company working on augmented reality has held their quarterly earnings calls with investors, and each addressed or at least mentioned the role of AR during their prepared remarks. However, Facebook's earnings call had some of the spicier commentary on the technology.
News: Facebook's Smartglasses Are the New AR Hype, but It's Becoming Clearer That a Metaverse Platform War Is Coming
Facebook's earnings calls are generally focused on numbers—revenue and user growth. But this week the company's founder and CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, carved out a significant portion of the call to elaborate on Facebook's plans for immersive computing.
AR Snapshots: Snapchat's Latest Augmented Reality Lens Turns Celebrities into Lip-Syncing Pop Stars
The Lens Studio community, now made up of more than 200,000 creators, has generated some impressive augmented reality effects in the last few years. Amazingly, the groundbreaking Lenses for Snapchat continue to come, often from the internal AR team at Snap.
Market Reality: Snap & Epic Games Acquisitions, Nreal v. Epic Games, AR on Oculus Quest, & HoloLens at the Olympics
It's already been a banner year for mergers and acquisitions in the augmented reality industry, with WaveOptics and Ubiquity6 among the notable companies acquired. Two of the more active M&A players, Snap and Epic Games, continued their respective buying sprees this week with major deals supporting their AR strategies.
News: Facebook Finally Opens Oculus Quest Passthrough Feature to Developers, Making the VR Device an AR Playground
Facebook Reality Labs chief Andrew "Boz" Bosworth does a lot of hinting and teasing of what's coming next at Oculus, often with only a vague timeline on the horizon.
News: This Is How Japanese Wireless Giant Docomo Is Using the HoloLens 2 to Add AR to the Olympics
On Friday, the Tokyo Olympics finally kicked off after massive delays and complications due to the pandemic.
News: BMW Releases Art Car Series of Famed Artists, Including Jeff Koons and Andy Warhol, in Augmented Reality
One app is continuing to make a name for itself as the go-to platform for celebrity art that transcends canvas and paint and moves in augmented reality.
News: Snap Adds Upper Garment Segmentation, Multiple Object Detection, & More with Lens Studio 4.1
After adding full-body tracking and 3D body mesh in its past two Lens Studio updates, Snap continues to supply creators, particularly apparel retailers, with tools for creating clothing-centric AR experiences.
News: Epic Games Builds on Metaverse Foundation with Sketchfab Acquisition
Already among the leaders in AR development tools via its Unreal Engine, Epic Games has added another tanky weapon to its arsenal.
News: Nreal Fires Back Legal Countersuit at Epic Games Over Naming Dispute
The legal battle between Epic Games and augmented reality startup Nreal isn't cooling off anytime soon.
News: Snap Continues AR Buying Spree with Vertebrae Acquisition
Snapchat parent company Snap has opened up its war chest to acquire yet another company that will play a role in its augmented reality ecosystem.
News: Snap Spectacles Used to Turn Spoken Word Poetry into an Augmented Reality Experience
From the front lines of mainstreaming augmented reality smartglasses comes the latest update from Snap and its Spectacles wearable.
Market Reality: Facebook AR & Space Jam, Virgin Galactic AR App, Asics NFTs, & Shark Week on Snapchat
A pair of properties from the soon-to-merge Warner Media and Discovery companies chose different platforms for their augmented reality marketing, with Warner film Space Jam: A New Legacy opting to go with Facebook and Discovery Channel publishing an AR experience through Snapchat.
News: Google Extends Support for Google Meet to Google Glass Enterprise Edition 2
Due to the apparent lackluster adoption of its Explorer Edition, it can be easy to forget that Google Glass still exists as an enterprise product.
News: This Is How You Can Join LeBron James & Warner Bros. Space Jam Cartoon Characters in Augmented Reality
The remake of the Warner Bros. classic animation meets live-action movie Space Jam, this time starring LeBron James instead of Michael Jordan, hits theaters today.
AR Snapshots: Dive into Shark Week with These Snapchat AR Lenses
Shark Week, which debuted in 1988 as a week of programming on the Discovery Channel dedicated to the titular predatory fish, has grown into a cultural beast of its own.
News: DigiLens Looks to Plastic Waveguides as Alternative to Glass for AR Smartglasses Displays
When it comes to the future of AR smartglasses, DigiLens has one word for you. Just one word. Are you listening? Plastics.
News: Asics Brings Its Sneaker Magic to the 3D World via NFT Auction
Some tried to call it a brief cryptocurrency-fueled fad, but it looks like NFTs are here to stay. Now, one of the biggest sneaker companies on the planet, Japan's Asics, is getting into the game with its own set of NFTs, and there's a virtual object component included.
News: Rokid's New Smartglasses Mirror Content from Smartphones, Desktops, & Consoles to Virtual Screens
After receiving $100 million in funding in 2018, smartglasses maker Rokid is going the crowdfunding route to finance its latest product.
News: Camera IQ Gives Cosmetics Brands the Power to Push Virtual Try-on Effects to Snapchat, Facebook, & Instagram
Cosmetics brands have a long love affair with augmented reality, embracing virtual try-on effects as a means to help sell eyeliner, hair color, lipstick, and the like.
News: Virgin Galactic App Uses Augmented Reality to Let You Sample Space Tourism with Richard Branson
Billionaire Richard Branson did his part to advance space tourism this weekend by beating Elon Musk (SpaceX) and Jeff Bezos (Blue Origin) to become the first among them to travel into space.
Market Reality: Facebook & Harry Potter AR, MLB AR App, Doritos AR Ads, NFT Holographic Future, & Google Meet AR Filters
Brands are increasingly adopting augmented reality to promote their products and services, and they have multiple paths for bringing AR experience to their audiences.
News: How to Watch Japan's Viral 3D Cat Live, and How It All Started in China & South Korea
The most viral internet cat of the moment is a virtual kitty trapped in a billboard in the Shinjuku district of Tokyo, Japan.
News: MLB Now Lets Fans Experience Home Run Derby in Augmented Reality via New App
The 2021 season of Major League Baseball (MLB) is in full swing, and now that vaccines are widespread in the US, major baseball stadiums are allowing fans back in at full capacity.
News: Beeple's NFT Startup Wenew Could Pave Way for Holographic Displays as Archival Asset
Digital artist Beeple's $69 million NFT art auction at Christie's has a second act called Wenew, and includes attempting to open the digital art floodgates to mainstream collectors and artists alike by using physical goods.
News: Facebook Puts a Spell on Portal Devices & Mobile Apps with Harry Potter AR Experience
Augmented reality technology is often likened to magic powers, so it is fitting that a new AR experience featuring the Harry Potter franchise uses the newest AR tricks from Facebook and its Spark AR platform.
Market Reality: Ubiquity6 Acquired, JigSpace Funded, Snapchat in the Viber App, & US Army HoloLens Testing
The close of the second quarter of 2021 brought about a flurry of merger and acquisition and financing activity in the augmented reality industry, headlined by the acquisition of Ubiquity6 and JigSpace's new multimillion-dollar funding round.
AR Snapshots: Fire Off These Snapchat AR Lenses Instead of Fireworks for the Fourth of July
The Fourth of July, the celebration of US independence, as well as the second paid holiday of the summer, has arrived.
Opinion: Cash App & Megan Thee Stallion — Making Smartglasses Cool Again Starts Here, with the Culture
No, Jack Dorsey's Cash app isn't about to launch an augmented reality device (er, I don't think...), but its latest outing is about as close as we've come to full confirmation that the wearable AR age is upon us.
News: AR Cloud Startup Ubiquity6 Gobbled Up by Discord
The herd of augmented reality cloud startups that emerged in 2018 have been hunted to near extinction, with Google-backed Ubiquity6 the latest to move from an independent entity to a wholly-owned asset.
Market Reality: Apple & Samsung Partner with Snap, HoloLens 2 at the Museum, & Inside the Varjo Reality Cloud
While Snap may eventually compete with Apple and Samsung in selling smartglasses to consumers, today it is helping them achieve their business objectives via augmented reality.
News: Snap Teams with Universal Music Group to Further Mainstream Its AR Platforms
The march of Snap to become the world's augmented reality engine isn't slowing down. In a new deal announced on Thursday, Snap has revealed that it has signed an agreement to become the software driving Universal Music Group's (UMG) mobile AR music offerings.
News: Varjo Reality Cloud Makes Virtual Teleportation Possible with XR-3 Headset & Its LiDAR Sensor
While Apple was one of the first to integrate LiDAR into mobile devices for depth sensing, headset maker Varjo has developed a truly remarkable feat with its implementation of the sensor.
News: Microsoft HoloLens 2 Brings Extinct Animals Back to Life at Paris National Museum
We already know that the US Army will be using its modified HoloLens 2 for special missions, and major businesses are deploying the augmented reality device for enterprise use cases.
News: Apple & Snapchat Use AR to Let You Travel on the New York Subway System via Apple Pay
Many years ago, when I first traveled to Tokyo, Japan, I was amazed by the contactless IC card turnstiles embedded in the county's subway system.
News: Snap Spectacles Get a New App for Hands-Free Drawing in AR
If you thought Snap's Spectacles were limited to a couple of demos, you haven't been paying attention.
News: Nissan Launches 3D Car Experience on the Streets of London
The recent release of the Looking Glass Portrait has gotten the public excited about personal displays that simulate 3D visuals, but in the public display marketing space, this is an area that has already received a lot of attention.
Market Reality: Apple & Facebook Spill AR Details, Niantic's AR Transformers, Looking Glass Unboxed, & Snap's Viral Lens
The makers of arguably the two most important mobile AR apps, Niantic and Snap, both had good news this week, with the former preparing to replicate its success with Pokémon GO for another franchise and the latter notching another popular augmented reality Lens for Snapchat.
News: Mark Zuckerberg Reveals More About Facebook's Upcoming Smartglasses Set to Debut This Year
Ever since Facebook announced its partnership with Luxxotica brand Ray-Ban to produce smartglasses, the augmented reality space has been on high alert awaiting more details.