Types of AR experiences
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- AR for shopping and retail
Though it's a young medium,
augmented reality is already being used in a variety of different capacities.
In this section, we'll look at a few of the most popular.
Let's begin with shopping.
Because it integrates seamlessly with the real world,
AR has proven to be a powerful medium for shopping and retail.
AR can let you try on a watch, a shirt or
a new shade of makeup, all without ever leaving your home.
But the top use case for AR shopping right now is furniture.
According to a few major studies,
furniture is the number one thing people want to shop for with AR.
It's tough to know if a $1,000 couch will be the right one for
you, if you aren't sure it'll fit right in your living room or match your curtains.
AR's unique ability to work within the world around us, makes it easy to
integrate digital versions of furniture right inside your house.
Unlike 2D images,
which force you to imagine the object in your home, AR makes full use of 3D space.
Letting you see the furniture at the exact size and dimensions of real life.
Major furniture retailers, like IKEA and
Houzz, have put idea like this into practice.
With the option to purchase included directly within the application.
- AR for business
When it comes to business,
AR core enables experiences for many different kinds of professional organizations.
Warehouses can build helpful navigations and instructions for workers.
Architecture firms can display designs in 3D space.
Retailers can give customers novel ways to engage with products,
and advertisers can reach consumers with immersive campaigns.
This is just the tip of the iceberg.
The power of AR is that it lets users build relationships with brands
inside their physical spaces rather than trapped behind screens.
- AR for Social Media
One of the most obvious uses for AR is social media and social sharing.
Snapchat was the first media platform to fully embrace AR.
The platform introduced lenses in 2015,
building off the popularity of filters.
These allowed users to digitally augment and manipulate
faces including that famous rainbow-vomiting lens.
Though many may not have thought of it this way,
it is a lightweight expression of AR.
Facebook also followed the lead with its own AR camera-fixed platform.
Google is working to develop an intuitive platform for creating
content for social AR through AR stickers.
Stickers allow users to import
animated and interactive 3D objects for use in social media.
- AR for Gaming
Although the usability is still being fully explored, air devices and
smartphones are able to pull of some truly one-of-a-kind entertainment experiences.
In 2016, Pokemon Go became the first viral AR game.
Since then, we've seen the launch of similar games from mainstream franchises
like Harry Potter, The Walking Dead, and Ghost Busters, and
we'll see many more in the coming years.
But location based adventure games like these are only
one possible game application for AR.
We're also seeing development in genres ranging arcade to tabletop games,
as well as some types of games that have never existed before.
It's also worth noting that while Pokemon Go was popular,
it also wasn't full AR as it just overlaid flat 2-D images on the real world.
Creatures in that initial launch of Pokemon Go didn't behave the way they
would if they were actually in your physical space.
Instead they floated on your screen and only looked properly embedded in
the environment if you lined them up with the ground.
- AR for Education
Demonstrating complex subjects is another one of AR's greatest capabilities,
allowing learners to engage with spatial content visualized right in front of them.
To that end, Google launched an AR application for education.
Expeditions AR is an educational experience designed to help teachers show
students information with simple and engaging AR visuals.
For example, students can explore a strand of DNA, inspect the statue of David or
even witness an intense category five hurricane.
Spatial learning allows students to engage with 3D content directly,
rather than having to imagine it while reading a textbook.
Google's Expeditions AR is an educational experience designed to help teachers show
students information with augmented reality.
And education is even a broader category than the classroom.
AR will allow us to create training environments where we can measure and
incorporate information in real time.
- AR for healthcare
AR is already used in medicine,
and that will only increase as the technology matures.
Doctors and nurses are using
AR's enhanced visualization capabilities to more successfully diagnose patients,
plan procedures, and execute treatment plans.
3D visuals offer much more for these doctors to learn in comparison to 2D visuals,
and interactive 3D visuals,
like the ones in AR experiences, offer even more.
AR could one day replace traditional charts or
guide surgeons through complex operations one step at a time.
Medical science is one of the most exciting areas for
AR to impact both today and tomorrow.
The one thing all of these arenas have in common is
their need for new and better AR content.
That's where tools like AR Core and future creators like you come into play.
- AR for nonprofits
Nonprofits can use AR to help build
brand identity and encourage deeper engagement around critical issues.
For example, say an organization wants to
educate the public about the impacts of climate change.
They could give a presentation in front of
a few 100 people or they could create an air experienced outlets
millions of smartphone users view what
their own backyards might look like in extreme drought or flood.
Allowing audiences to see the real-world effects of systemic problems,
makes AR a powerful strategy for nonprofits and
other social impact organizations to enhance their messaging.
