Well AR is an upcoming field and we don’t know the full potential of it yet although we have a good idea how it can be integrated into our daily lives. There will be no more phones and all we use might be just glasses be it to make phone calls, find directions, pay in restaurants and probably even at work! This futuristic vision of the hololens Microsoft is the vision to have. None of the basic necessities like a watch, clock, television and cool items to fill your house would be required. Instead it will be a designer word. You can have it the way you want.
Let us just imagine we had the power like astro projecting yourself in Dr. Strange or Thanos from Marvel to distort reality to create something that we like. Granted we wouldn’t be able to touch the object physically. What would you do with such power? No really give it a thought. I would love to have a text free world. Everything that I require would appear right beside in the form of videos. Maybe later on the brain signals along with deep learning can be read to make a predictive options as to what you want to do at the moment. I know I am talking light years ahead from now but it is good to have a vision to work towards. Life will be so much easier. Imagine living in a not-so-great apartment but once those glasses come on you can see a whole different place. You can hang out with your friends who stay in remote locations.
Now the best we can get to in this stage is tracking with the help of an image target successfully (although without the image target is possible too), none of the applications have reached a level of marketing the product, as the technology is not there yet. But we are making steady progress!
Since majority of the world uses smart phones we can make apps using Vuforia and Unity to augment everyday life. While standing at a bus stand why use your phone to be by yourself and listen to music or read the news. You can meet interesting characters around your location though your phone. Restaurants can use an app to have a virtual waiter come up to your table and take the order and all you need is an app. That would be a great marketing strategy as well! Learning process in schools will take a whole new level with this. The students can see the physical model or process of what they are studying about. It is interactive and fun. You can have a personal assistant to get a human feel to the augmented reality. Being able to interact with the environment can be fun. I mean a lot of fun. But for the environment to interact voluntarily with us is another experience altogether. A person uses the AR app the look at his surroundings. If another person is waiting with you in the same room then some interaction can take place. Shops can do virtual marketing by putting up an assistant right outside the shop that helps us with anything we want. This is a great way to combat human fatigue and shop closing times. It can be used for communicating with people that speak a different language. No one needs to feel alone anymore. It can be used as a strategy to combat depression as well. A virtual therapist doesn’t just sound cool but also makes up for human time constraints.
Like the theme of this project we can get motivation to eat healthy and inculcate in kids to have a a liking towards healthy food and reduce the consumption of junk food. Augmented reality educational games can be a fun way for the kids to learn and develop knowledge. With the wake of technologies like Unity and Vuforia creating and distributing AR games have become so easy that we take it for granted. With such great software, comes great applications and if produced in the right way we can make a change in society for the better. For example the introduction of Augmented Reality to the medical field has made it easy for the users to understand and visualize the human body. Similarly introduction of AR to any field can enhance the learning process and make innovation easier. According to The Computer Science As a Toolsmith II we understand that ”The scientist builds in order to study; the engineer studies in order to build”. So let us as engineers build a better future for the others and make the world a better place for others.
In the end having fun with what we have around us and making life easier is the goal. This no doubt can be achieved with AR. You don’t need to rely on getting help doing something, don’t need to stay away from friends or family, learn about the place you are at, etc. I think this is a good start for a wonderful future ahead.