Augmented reality Articles on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog

Daily iPhone App: Pocket Universe

by Mel Martin (Jan 25th, 2012)

Pocket Universe has been one of my favorite astronomy apps for the iPhone. Take it outside to easily identify what's up using the charts and the built-in augmented reality features. With an update that hit the app store yesterday, you can now talk to Pocket Universe, using Siri speech recognition ...

Amazon's Flow app is augmented reality shopping goodness

by Michael Grothaus (Nov 10th, 2011)

Amazon quietly released a new iPhone app last week that aims to give other bar code scanning apps a run for their money. The free app, called Flow, isn't revolutionary in its bar code scanning capabilities. Oh, it scans bar codes just fine, but the beauty of Flow is that it does more than just ...

Starbucks launching augmented reality Cup Magic app for the holidays

by Mike Schramm (Nov 8th, 2011)

Starbucks is going to kick off the holiday season with a special app for iPhone and Android devices that will interact with art on holiday cups at the popular coffee shops around the world. You can see the app in action in the video below. As you can see, it's not really so functional as just a ...

Patent suggests augmented reality coming to Maps and Compass apps

by Chris Rawson (Aug 19th, 2011)

According to Patently Apple, a new patent application from Apple suggests the company is interested in baking augmented reality functions into the iPhone's built-in Maps and Compass apps. In one implementation suggested by the patent, users could take a picture of their surroundings and perform ...

iPhone augmented reality browser Junaio used to "block" billboards in NYC

by Kelly Hodgkins (Aug 1st, 2011)

PublicAdCampaign and The Heavy Projects worked together to include an ad-scrubbing feature in the augmented reality browser Junaio. This trial feature lets NYC residents replace outdoor advertisements in a handful of locations including Times Square with art from indie artists/activists. This ...

CrowdOptic could raise the bar for augmented reality apps

by David Winograd (May 11th, 2011)

Augmented reality may be taking the next giant step forward with CrowdOptic, an app that will provide a graphic data overlay for live events. If you are at a concert (with the system in place), point the app at the stage and you'll get details like those in the picture above. Point it at a ...

Panasonic app uses AR to place your new big screen dreams

by Mike Schramm (Apr 29th, 2011)

Just in time for the weekend, this is about the wackiest use of augmented reality that we've seen yet. The Panasonic Viera AR Setup Simulator is a brand new free app in the App Store that uses AR to put a virtual big screen television right in your living room, so you can see what it looks like ...

Navigon adds augmented reality and enhanced traffic to iOS apps

by Mel Martin (Apr 14th, 2011)

You can add augmented reality to the feature list for the Navigon app. The company calls it Reality Scanner, and it shows destinations and nearby points of interest by superimposing that information over a live camera view. This is a feature best used by pedestrians; I'd hate to see someone ...

Parrot set to release AR.FlyingAce game for AR.Drone quadricopter

by Steven Sande (Apr 11th, 2011)

The TUAW blogging team has had a group gadget crush on the US$299 AR.Drone quadricopter since we first got our anxious little hands on the iPhone-controlled flying machine at Macworld Expo 2010. At the time, manufacturer Parrot said that it would be coming out with an open software development ...

String Labs' augmented reality showcase app for iPhone

by David Quilty (Feb 7th, 2011)

Want to see one of the ways that you're going to use that iPhone in the future? You should do yourself a favor and check out what String Labs is doing with their new augmented reality engine, String. What is AR, you ask? It's the merging of both your real-world environment and a virtual one, ...

Where To? adds augmented reality

by Mel Martin (Feb 4th, 2011)

I've looked at Where To? in the past, and found it a well thought out way to find points of interest in your vicinity. Another plus is that it integrates with the Navigon and TomTom apps so that you can send information for precise navigation. Now the app has added a new wrinkle: augmented reality. ...

eBay's mobile app strategy shared at CES

by Mike Schramm (Jan 11th, 2011)

When I went to meet up with eBay at last week's CES conference, I went to a booth run not by that company, but by a company called RedLaser. Started by two U of Michigan grads, RedLaser is an eBay acquisition that has released a barcode scanning app for the iPhone that will scan your products and ...

Hands-on with Sphero at the CES 2011

by Mike Schramm (Jan 8th, 2011)

Sphero is this year's AR.Drone here in Las Vegas. Last year, the Parrot AR.Drone turned heads with an iPhone-controlled quadricopter, and this year, Sphero is creating a little buzz as an iPhone-controlled, well, ball. That's right -- the Sphero is a ball that both glows colors and rolls around at ...

360 Panorama: view augmented reality panoramas in Mobile Safari

by Steven Sande (Dec 21st, 2010)

We've talked about 360 Panorama before -- it's a cool app that lets you capture 360° panoramic photos in real time by just moving your iPhone around in a circle. The $0.99 app (available here) has been out for a while, but keeps receiving amazing updates that improve its functionality and wow ...

Word Lens hands-on: Does it really translate text in real-time?

by Victor Agreda, Jr. (Dec 17th, 2010)

Word Lens hit the store with a bang, promising real-time translation of signs, menus, and any other text your camera can capture. Does the augmented-reality app work? Somewhat, yes. Is it the future? Definitely. We're just not there yet. I'll let the images in the gallery tell the story. But ...