Reality with a Touch of the Virtual: How VPS Advances AR for Smartphones

Today’s smartphone owners can easily incorporate augmented reality into the real world with the help of their device's camera and visual positioning systems. Read on to discover how VPS is already used to create immersive AR experiences.

Modern smartphone users are already familiar with the capabilities of augmented reality in their smartphones. AR filters on Instagram and Snapchat aren’t out of the ordinary anymore. As well as placing AR furniture in your apartment to check how it could look before buying.

But what if augmented reality could be visible as a persistent layer of content which could be accessible through our smartphone or maybe later through AR glasses? A number of  projects emerged last year that could make it possible with a visual positioning technology (or VPS) — the localisation technology based on computer vision that helps to determine a user’s whereabouts by analysing visual cues of a known location. The technology can be used to identify position and orientation with a 0.5 metre accuracy both outdoors and indoors.

VPS-powered solutions are supported by most modern smartphones. You can also create your own VPS experience with nothing more than a camera-fitted phone and a dedicated framework, no expensive 360-degree cameras necessary.

The VPS technology enables a device to display handy or fun content over a camera image. A player can be fighting off robots in their favourite coffee shop without troubling other visitors (or getting unwanted attention from mental health services). A traveller can quickly get to the airport gate by simply following directions displayed on the screen.

Let’s explore how and where the VPS and AR technology is used today.

Navigation

Navigation apps with an augmented reality can help you quickly locate your airport gate or find your way around a large mall. Simply follow the directions displayed on the screen right on top of the camera image.

VPS can accurately navigate users even in those spaces where GPS signal is limited, such as malls, airports or office centres. Using computer vision to identify a user's precise location enables the development of a new level of navigation apps for indoors that could show a path from point A to point B with an augmented reality guidance on the screen. Using that accuracy the app could place AR content on a real object so a VPS-enabled app can be used as a museum guide or be a helpful tool for navigation on an industrial plant. Moreover, unlike the GPS, the VPS apps could determine not only the position of the user, but also the floor on which he is for a smooth navigation UX in a multi-storey building.

Check out how UK startup Hyper (ex-Dent Reality) uses VPS to offer a navigation for retail.

Navigation with a VPS could also be used to improve the user's experience outdoors. Niantic’s CEO John Hanke describe them perfectly on an interview to The Verge:

If you’ve ever had that experience of coming out of a subway station and trying to orient yourself, you walk a block before you realize you’re going in the wrong direction. There’s an AR map that lets a camera know exactly what it’s looking at in the world so that you can make the pokémon hide behind the park bench, or you can provide the information about the public artwork or the menu or the airport check-in.

Yes, the experience can also be gamified. Once the app calculates walking time to the gate, a message pops up inviting you to grab a quick cup in the airport’s coffee corner. So you arrive at the gate on time and get a good deal on your coffee.

Marketing and Storytelling

A game where users earn their discount by shooting a ball through the hoop that appears on the company's headquarters? Easy! With VPS contextual ads can be placed virtually anywhere: buildings, streets, billboards, or bus stops—you name it.

Location-based AR advertising campaigns are extremely viral. As users actively engage with interactive AR ads they compel others to join the fun.

Just take a look at the amazing AR show the virtual band Gorillaz performed in London. The buzz such events create can be compared to the virality of Fortnite’s in-game concerts. The project was based on Google GeoSpatial API that’s powered by VPS.

Social Media

AR is becoming the drive of collaborative creative expression in social media. As a shared AR experience, users can paint over the entire street or try on face filters together and then post the result.

Snap is the key player in the AR landscape, though other platforms are starting to catch up. Especially since content creation can be seamlessly merged with marketing campaigns. Also, AR is a powerful tool for attracting, retaining, and engaging with users on social networks. Snap is increasing its focus on AR as it recognises the great potential this technology has for attracting users with AR campaigns.

By identifying users in a shared virtual space, multiuser AR experiences can also prompt virtual interactions to turn into real-life ones (as long as all the users agree, of course).

A great example of this is a project by the Snap AR team that turned Paris's iconic Centre Pompidou into an auditory experience by Christian Marclay. As I can gather it also uses Snap's local lenses technology for precise placement of AR content above Centre Pompidou.

Tourism

AR can greatly enhance travel experience by educating tourists about places of interest or visualising what a street or a landmark looked like 5 or 500 years ago.

Combined with navigation, AR can be used to create custom self-guided tours where routes are tailored to users’ tastes: an architecture photography enthusiast will discover a city’s most iconic buildings while a coffee aficionado will embark on a coffee shop tour.

City Guide Tour already offers interactive guides around the world's most visited cities.

Live Events

With the key information about the game displayed on a screen over a camera image smartphones can boost fan experiences at football, hockey or other sporting events.

As part of live performances, AR can transform a concert into a powerful interactive show where artists turn themselves into digital avatars. Alternatively, Mixhalo offers immersive sound experiences—as concert attendees put on headphones, not only can they access studio-quality sound but also tune into a specific instrument or vocal mix.

Games

Gaming is one of the leading and fastest growing industries in terms of AR adoption. Take the record breaking Pokemon Go — the game still has thousands of fans worldwide. Soon we will see a large number of games that are set in real environments, such as streets or even buildings, rather than an imaginary world.

It comes as little surprise that by 2027, the global market size for AR gaming is estimated to top $33 billion, growing by 30-40% year-on-year and demonstrating a tenfold increase compared to 2020 levels. And this is just the beginning.

Final Thoughts

VPS has already greatly transformed AR experiences. With further advancement of the technology, the applications of AR will be practically limitless. Can’t wait to see more remarkable projects hitting the scene this year!