Gizmodo has a great video up for nooka, an augmented reality shopping feature for online purchases. Essentially the idea here is to attach a trackable device that provides dimentional information back to the computer–much like the technology used in CGI in films–to create a virtual wearable product.
Apple may own the day when it announces new product offerings such as iLife ‘10, iPhone OS 4.0 and the Apple iPad at its Keynote address Wednesday, but Microsoft, with the help of several UC-Berkeley students, may have the last laugh be catching on.
The collaboration between students and commercial developers have shown the viability of a technology that utilizes overhead camera+human interaction input to track, scan, manipulate and convert imagery using a behavior-sensitive light-table as opposed to a monitor or a photocopier.
The system is designed for “creative workflow” yet considering it supports keyboard and other peripherals as well as multiple workers at one table, this has the potential to be the future of strategic mapping, organizational charting, and conceptual design. Take a team of 2D or 3D modelers engineering a design and incorporating their changes to a central concept, based on real-time interaction. This tool offers a huge advantage for a team to engage in groupthink. Yet it can be made to do so much more. It reminds me of a sort of light-box or cutting board or drafting table with a few technical facets. It is to place-shifting touch-screens what the the prop engine is to a turbine.
Debkafile has a provocative article suggesting the methods the Iranian Government used technology to crush a growing resistance in the wake of allegedly marred presidential elections: