So I just got back from the ESRI User Conference 2013 in San Diego and wow, what a trip.

Founded by Jack Dangermond, ESRI (Environmental Systems Research Institute) is an industry leader and international supplier of Geographic Information System (GIS) software and geodatabase management applications. The company has an installed base of more than one million users in more than 350,000 organizations, including most US federal agencies and national mapping agencies, all 50 US state health departments, transportation agencies, forestry companies, utilities, state and local government, schools and universities, NGOs, and commercial business.

The user conference brought 15,000+ ESRI users from over 130 countries. Keynote presentations included Advisor to the Prime Minister of India on Public Information, Infrastructure, and Innovations Sam Pitroda and an inspiring discussion with pop culture icon Will.i.am. For the record I am a B.E.P. fan but this interview was something else.

This was my first time to attend the ESRI User Conference and I was amazed at the number of sessions, expo size (entire convention center floor), attendance, and diversity of the show. As an attendee pointed out, “GIS is everything” and it seems everything was represented at the event. Among what I saw on the trade show floor were a variety of mapping applications, LIDAR services (remote sensing technology that measures distance by illuminating a target with a laser and analyzing the reflected light) and drone data collection devices.

I am not a geo-specialist but I did recognize a few things I am familiar with. Among those was:

City Engine – a procedural modeling tool for rapidly creating large urban environments

Geoloqi – a platform for building location aware applications with geotriggers and realtime location capabilities.

Metaio – an Augmented Reality platform provider

One ESRI invited exhibitor was building company IDEAbuilder. IDEAbuilder uses geospatial data for a variety of uses in the building process and were showcasing a new application the company tech team has built that combines interactive 3D and digital fabrication with some ESRI tools and services. This was a great demonstration of how 2D/3D building data can connect with geospatial data to create highly intelligent interactive scenes.

The application that was shown was the virtual reality version of their Performance Shell Configurator or PSC. The PSC application is a green building tool for their builder partners that provides the builder the ability to go into an interactive 3D scene and snap together the shell of a structure from a library of digital fabrication ready components that can be robotically manufactured. These metadata rich components provide their partners with information useful to the building process. I posted several months back the web3D and Kinect version of this app that got covered on Wired.com (thanks Bruce Sterling!)

Some features of our Oculus Rift virtual reality version include Razer Hydra hand controller support, the ability to import a blueprint image to use as a guide to build on top of, a live top down map so you can see where you are on the blueprint, a total structure cost calculator, elevated cherry picker view, a virtual ‘AR’ view where staring at a panel piece displayed part information including cost, and free navigation of a City Engine city that acts as the 3D backdrop to the PSC building space. There will be an official post with more information about the PSC app on the IDEAbuilder site so stay tuned over there.

The application was a huge hit and really helped visitors experience new ways of interacting with data. While most people were unaware of the Oculus Rift or have never had a virtual reality experience before, there were those that were more than ready to get started like John Bormann. In addition to the PSC app, they also shared an Xbox 360 controller controlled architectural visualization Oculus Rift scene created by real life architect, web3D supporter, and IDEAbuilder friend Jon Brouchoud.

In closing, I would like to thank the IDEAbuilder team for this cool virtual reality experience, everyone I met at the event that helped me understand more about GIS, and the people at ESRI for the opportunity and everything they did to make it a super ‘geospecial’ time. See you next year!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zcnke3I_JAY

http://youtu.be/6br7NreTwD4

This development will mean an increase in performance, speed, and improvements in power consumption for mobile devices running augmented reality apps. Now augmented reality can be, “Always on, always augmented,” says CTO Peter Meier.

This first-of-its-kind collaboration will improve nearly all aspects of an Augmented Reality experience, yielding performance increases in speed, precision and power consumption, with up to 60 times faster initialization, more than an AR app running on existing platforms – the highest to date in the mobile industry. Both Metaio and ST-Ericsson strongly believe that working together will accelerate the adoption of Augmented Reality as a consumer technology.

“The AREngine will do for Augmented Reality what the GPU did years ago for the gaming industry,” said Metaio CTO Peter Meier. “This is a great leap in the AR space, and we strongly believe that the AR Engine working with ST-Ericsson platforms will help realize the Augmented City – the idea of a completely connected environment powered by Augmented Reality and made possible with next-gen, optimized mobile platforms.”

Check out the full press release here.

ARE2011

Still recovering from an augmented reality that happened last week. The video footage below shows elements from the Augmented Reality Event (ARE) 2011 in Santa Clara, CA on May 17-18.

This was the 2nd annual event of the largest conference dedicated to the business of augmented reality. Start-ups, developers, mobile and hardware companies along with organizations within entertainment, media, education, healthcare, government, tourism, and many more, will gather to evolve this hot technology sector into a productive, sustainable and entertaining new medium.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=FsN0tCkAR-Y

I will have written highlights from the event soon.

Today I saw Metaio’s press release stating, “The Black Eyed Peas debut in the world’s first 360-degree mobile music video.”

Information on the app from iTunes:

With BEP360 you can be dropped into the party with the worlds first 360 mobile music video. Hold up your iPhone4 or latest iPod Touch and watch as the BEP perform their hit single “The Time (Dirty Bit)” with you literally at the center of the party. Physically look around to change the view as you experience the song in innovative 360 degree video.

The app also features a cutting edge Augmented Reality experience. Just point your device at the album cover and see one of the Baby Peas popup and move to the beat. A chat bubble on top of their head reveals their latest tweet.

Augmented reality component of BEP app

Snap a pic of one of the Peas in your world and upload it to BEP EARTH where you can see people from all over the world sharing and celebrating their love for the BEP and their music.
Step into the Photo session and conduct a virtual Photo Shoot with the

Pea of your choice with the first ever virtual camera experience.
The Pea’s twitter streams are visualized for you and at the tap of an icon.
Finally a really cool puzzle game will keep you in the app for hours of fun.

From what I saw in the video of the app working at the Will.i.apps site, it seems to use the accelerometer and compass of the iDevices to provide a ‘virtual camera’ type effect for navigating the UI, looking at content, and watching the music video. A very clever technique for interaction.

Although iTunes lists the developer of the app as Talent Media LLC, the press release states the app is a collaborative project between Will.i.apps, Metaio (for the AR), and 3D360 (for the 360 video).  The BEP360 app is available for $2.99 from the App Store on iPhone, iPod touch and iPad, or at:www.bit.ly/bep360app.

The QR code on the poster still doesn’t do anything, but I am glad to see the BEP get such a cool app.

Augmented Reality Lego Kiosk

The augmented-reality (AR) “Digital Box” application for Lego made by augmented reality company Metaio came out in Lego stores world wide earlier this year.

I got the chance to play with this for the first time at a Lego store at Northpark Mall in Dallas, Texas. See video here Augmented Reality Legos.

Hold up selected boxes of Lego to a kiosk that contains of a webcam, a screen, and Metaio’s AR technology. A 3D animation of the assembled toy is projected on screen on top of the box the consumer is holding. It is then possible to view the finished toy on screen from all angles.

Most of the patrons in the store walked right past this kiosk until I started to play with this. Once people saw what I was doing they took more interest in the AR kiosk and then began to play with it. I recommend Lego put better indicators on the boxes that have the AR component. People enjoyed the 3D animations from the boxes that worked but frustration was apparent as most boxes were not AR ready and this caused lack of interest quickly after the initial wow. Regardless, a cool application of technology with a childhood favorite.

Scanning the Black Eyed Peas Poster

Saw this poster for the Black Eyed Peas and it didn’t work. As an augmented reality developer and fan of BEP, I had to fix this.

Here is the video I made of Augmenting the Black Eyed Peas Time. Android apps used in this example are Google Goggles and Junaio from Metaio.