So you want to become an augmented
reality content creator or maybe you
want to design or develop custom AR apps.
The only problem is you just don't
understand how AR works. Well, this video
is for you. Before we get started, I
actually want to clarify something.
Augmented reality can be subdivided in
different modalities such as visual,
auditory or haptics. In this video, we're
going to focus on visual-based AR. If
someone asked you what augmented reality
was, how would you define it in one
sentence? Pause the video and submit your
answer in the comments below. This is how
I define augmented reality: AR is a
digital medium that allows you to
overlay
virtual content into the physical world
in a way that makes it seem like the
content is physically there. AR
essentially allows us to merge the
digital and physical worlds. I bet you're
curious to know how this magical
technology actually works. It all starts
with AR enabled hardware such as a phone
or glasses. Most importantly, AR uses a
system of cameras and in some devices
also time-of-flight 3d depth sensors to
see and understand the physical world
around you. Imagine entering a room
you've never ever been in, what do you
tend to do? You look around and make
sense of your surroundings. Your mind
builds a mental model of the space so
that you can memorize it and recall it
the next time you enter the same space.
The processor in your head mapped the
environment using images from the dual
camera system on your face. Similarly,
your phone or glasses also map your
surrounding environment and build a
model of it using hardware sensors and
specialized software, in this case
computer vision and machine learning
software. Now imagine this room again,
when we move around the room we can
pretty accurately estimate our location
within it.
This is possible because we take into
account our relative position to
important features in the room, such as
the walls, the desk and ultra-wide monitor.
In AR this is referred to as tracking or
localization. The research community has
a fun word called SLAM which stands for
Simultaneous Localization and Mapping.
This is what your phone or glasses do
many times a second.
They map your environment but also keep
track of where you are in relation to it.
This is so important to understand. Once
mapping and localization are working
well for a new environment, an AR
experience can begin. But how does the
placement of AR content actually work?
When placing AR content, your phone or
glasses really place them in the virtual
map of the environment. The virtual map, however, is invisible. So that's why it
looks like the digital content is placed
in the physical world. It is therefore
really important that our virtual map is
accurate and aligned with its physical
counterpart. In addition to mapping and
localization, your AR device also senses
other characteristics of the environment, for example the light intensity and
color temperature. To make things appear
as realistic as possible, our AR devices
sense the conditions of our environment
and project that onto our digital
content as well. And that is how AR works.
It maps your environment and tracks your
location within it. By doing that, it
allows you to place digital content into
the physical world in a way that makes
you and those around you believe that it
is actually there. I hope that you're
super stoked to get started with
augmented reality. The technology feels
magical and AR has a true potential to
disrupt every single industry on earth.
I'm willing to bet it'll even spawn new
industries we haven't yet imagined.
Now I know AR is still very new and
uncertain, so where do you get started?
Well I'm glad you asked.
Subscribe to my channel and I will guide
you along the way.
I will regularly upload content for my
new series AR for Beginners. So tell me,
what will you create?
