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Cellphones Displays Iphone Apple

Will The iPhone 8 Include Augmented Reality? (bgr.com) 55

Posted by EditorDavid from the augmented-iPhones dept.
Earlier this month Mashable wrote "it's now even more obvious what [Apple] is working to bring to the masses, and it's probably not, as some rumors have indicated, virtual reality." They cited CEO Tim Cook's recent predictions that augmented reality "is going to become really big" -- he said it again on Thursday -- and BuzzFeed noted that Apple "has quietly put into place the components of what could prove to be an AR ecosystem: The iPhone 7 Plus has...a two-camera system capable of gathering stereoscopic data and generating image depth maps... In Apple Watch, the company has a spatially-aware, wearable device outfitted with an accelerometer and GPS. In its new AirPod wireless earphones, Apple essentially has a pair of diminutive, spatially-aware microcomputers -- each one with an Apple W1 wireless chip (the company's first), two accelerometers, two optical sensors, beam-forming microphones, and an antenna... And sources tell BuzzFeed News that the company has recently been taking meetings with immersive content companies like Jaunt.
Their article also lists AR companies that Apple's bought over the last three years -- plus their patents for a "head-mounted display" and a "peripheral treatment for head-mounted displays." BGR adds that Tim Cook "likes to tease future products," and points out that Cook has even said Apple is working on AR features "behind the curtain". This casts a new light on those rumors of an all-glass case for next year's iPhone 8. Will the whole body of the phone become part of an Augmented Reality display system? (And could AR also explain Apple's aggressive push for wireless headphones?)
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Will The iPhone 8 Include Augmented Reality? More

Will The iPhone 8 Include Augmented Reality?

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  • Ob (Score:5, Funny)

    by Hognoxious ( 631665 ) on Sunday October 16, 2016 @02:39PM (#53086381) Homepage Journal

    It will make you think it has a headphone socket?

    • Of course. Those crafty bastards must have finally managed to distill the essence of Steve Jobs to produce an augmented reality distortion field.
  • "There’s no substitute for human contact"
  • And idiot bloggers are already churning out shit about a phone a year away. Yawn

    • It started before the 7 came out.

    • Precisely! And having gotten a new iPhone 7, I'm not likely to replace it until it's actually dead. The only reason I upgraded to it from 5s was Apple Pay, and now, there's no other reason to upgrade. I have the 128GB model, so even storage won't likely be an issue. Only other thing I'll be upgrading next month will be my iPad mini, and that too b'cos it just has 16GB of storage in it.

      Whenever this phone dies, I anticipate that iPhone 7 will be the entry level phone in the market. Any configuration

  • I'm hoping for a kitchen sink!

  • ...isnt iPhone specific. Technically any smartphone with a camera can become "augmented reality" with the right software.

    In the phones case its simply just 3D graphics overlay, with plane/movement/motion tracking software.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Technically any smartphone with a camera can become "augmented reality" with the right software.

      Or a microphone and headphones. Probably lots of other combinations too. Augmentation of reality doesn't need to rely on visual components.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by geek ( 5680 )

      ...isnt iPhone specific. Technically any smartphone with a camera can become "augmented reality" with the right software.

      In the phones case its simply just 3D graphics overlay, with plane/movement/motion tracking software.

      You're missing the part about the headset. Microsoft really kicked this into gear with HoloLens. Apple sees the writing on the wall with that. Google Glass was pretty inspirational, if you look at the videos they put out early on where glass was constantly reporting to you visually things in your surroundings. Those things never came to pass unfortunately.

      Apple has a real opportunity here. If they can put all of this together (which is their strong suit) then we could really see a revolution in tech. VR ha

      • Apple is looking to make a big splash for the iPhones 10th anniversary next year so I wouldn't put it past them to do something like this.

        I'm kind of two minds of this.

        On one hand, I think it's "too soon" for Apple to jump in. They're rarely the first to actually put out an on-the-shelves product of any given technology (the HoloLens is real and from what I've read pretty cool, but it's not exactly at my local Best Buy, and the less said about Glass the better). Typically Apple jumps in late to the game with a smart implementation of tech that ends up copied by others, and my gut tells me that AR wouldn't be any different.

        That said, Apple a

      • Apple has a real opportunity here. If they can put all of this together (which is their strong suit) then we could really see a revolution in tech. VR has no appeal to me and I suspect most others. Its really only useful for gaming. AR on the other hand has so many possibilities that it is really incredible if we can truly get there. In a sense AR will do for us what internet searches originally did. Truly AR feels like the logical extension of todays technology.

        Exactly. Well said!

  • Metro was an OK enough idea until MS implemented it and rammed it down everyone's throats. Similar well-meaning but fundamentally flawed reasoning is possible here.

    Just as Metro took away the task bar in favor of invisible UI elements, Apple took away the analog jack in favor of wireless headphones.

    • I don't believe AR will become Apple's Metro. First, Apple is often isn't the first ones to push risky new technologies, so I have my doubts they'll have anything ready for shipping by next year. They watch what others do, then try to do it with more polish and style. Second, even if they did some AR-focused product, I don't believe Apple is so stupid as to think AR should replace the fundamental iOS UI paradigm.

      Whatever mistake removing the phone jack may (or may not) be, and however overhyped AR may be

  • An iphone7 with "dual cameras" is not capable of producing depth maps, just like none of the Android phones with two cameras, side by side, less than 1cm apart, can produce depth maps. These are two different cameras with different lenses, which are used to give 2D images greater dynamic range and resolution.

    Stereo cameras, which are capable of producing depth maps and creating 3D images and environments, are two identical cameras that are placed at minimum one to two inches apart, as seen in the HTC Evo 3D

    • An iphone7 with "dual cameras" is not capable of producing depth maps

      And yet it does.

      What's with the scare quotes around "dual cameras", anyway? Do you not believe that the 7 Plus has two cameras?

    • An iphone7 with "dual cameras" is not capable of producing depth maps, just like none of the Android phones with two cameras, side by side, less than 1cm apart, can produce depth maps. These are two different cameras with different lenses, which are used to give 2D images greater dynamic range and resolution.

      Stereo cameras, which are capable of producing depth maps and creating 3D images and environments, are two identical cameras that are placed at minimum one to two inches apart, as seen in the HTC Evo 3D, the Amazon Fire Phone, and the Lenovo Phab 2. They are fundamentally different.

      Hey dumbass. Apple never claimed they were used for stereoscopic imaging. Their miniscule parallax is being used ONLY to create a pseudo-depth-map, for use with a software-simulated "narrow depth of field" effect that is often used in portrait (and other) photography with "real" cameras. The effect is so popular that it was actually worth the effort and expense in software and hardware, apparently. The fact that they were able to get additional utility out of the 2nd camera by fitting it with a "telephoto"

  • Sorry, 'Young Frankenstein' hangover.

    That said, Apple could do something potentially cool.

    The recent Pokémon Go craze showed that, given the right stimulus, a large segment of the population will act like lemmings. And spend money to do it.

    If Apple comes up with some kind of SUPER TWITFACE VR app, and monetizes it, you heard it here first.

  • Considering that iPhone users already exist in a reality distortion field, this is no great leap.

  • I wonder if it will have a mode that will cancel out the Apple reality distortion bubble, turning the "one word: courage" speech into it's proper "fuck you, buy our shit" speech. ;)

  • Why in the fuck are you asking me that? I came here to get the news, not to be asked what the news is. Shit.

  • "augmented reality", or as we called it 10 years ago when we did it with a camera we manufactured, "blending two images together".
  • I read somewhere a few months ago, that Apple was snapping-up AR (and VR?) talent. They don't do that for no reason.

    Ah, here's an article [theverge.com]...

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