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3D Social Media Augments Reality with Crowd-Sourced Geo-tags

R. Colin Johnson | Date: 08-26-10 | Comments

The emerging spate of augmented reality apps�of which Sekai Camera is the first�uniquely meld social media, geo-tagging and crowd-sourced entertainment to allow iPhone, iPad and Android smartphone users to look through their handset's camera and see the world around them augmented with informational icons added by other users.

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3D Social Media Augments Reality with Crowd-Sourced Geo-tags
Sekai Camera fuses your smartphone's camera data, GPS location, magnetometer orientation and accelerometer tilt to lock down the location and content of user-generated information icons strewn about the real world. For instance, overlaying the posters around the movie ticket office, your Sekai Camera may reveal icons housing movie reviews left by other users. And after going to a movie, you might want leave a competing review yourself�hanging there in midair next to its poster.

Tokyo's skyline is already brimming over with information icons left by Sekai Camera users (source: Sekai Camera).

For several years now, the "heads-up" concept has been harnessed by organizations like the Air Force. For instance, tactical icons can be superimposed onto a fighter pilot's canopy, identifying enemy from friendly planes. Civilians, however, were first exposed to augmented reality (AR) in James Cameron's movie "T1." There, the terminator had tactical information on his display that used artificial intelligence (AI) to recognize human objects and overlay information about them, such as how to shift the transmission on a tractor trailer. Sekai Camera is a crowd-sourced version of that dream sequence, where, instead of AI, you depend on other users to add the commentary.

Sekai Camera users can adorn dull streets like this one with flowers, each of which reveals a message when you touch it on your display (source: Sekai Camera).

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