Seriously Obsessed!

This week's assignment was to tool around on sites and see what's out there in the tech world of AR and VR.  I had a great time exploring and there are some extraordinary images and visuals but, in several cases, it was only informational and minimally experiential without a headset or device or downloading the app. I dug in.

My absolute favorite was Civilisations AR (BBC) which I downloaded onto my iPhone and with which am now quite seriously obsessed. So let me start there...

CIVILISATIONS AR (BBC) advertises itself as "putting history in your hand"...and it does! The app brings art and culture directly to your device and allows you to interact with it in a 3-dimensional way.  

See that globe?  That globe doesn't exist in my sewing room, except as a 3D image.  I can spin the globe and choose historical artifacts to bring into that space and study and interact with them.

Yep...that's Rodin's Kiss sitting on my ottoman (hope they are comfortable) and, because I can, I rotated the sculpture to observe a different angle.

There are thousands of artifacts to choose from and I've been dazzled by the interface.  It's really quite amazing! Imagine allowing students to experience art in this way without having to figure out how to bus them to the MET or fly them to the Louvre! 

Google had several very interesting AR/VR art platforms and 3D object libraries like Tilt Brush and Poly but I read that they will be shutting down these applications as they have deemed them unsuccessful. Google also recently stopped selling its Daydream VR headsets and shut down its Spotlight Stories VR studio along with the Daydream Play Movies and TV app.

The Google Earth VR site was breathtaking and reminded me of the very early 3D IMAX movies that I went to where the audience (myself included) would reach out to try to touch the seemingly real objects and images. Being able to 'visit' far away places has the obvious advantages of not having to leave your couch or classroom but it's more than that in the ability to go where it is difficult for even the most adventurous to travel.  The perspectives are also unique and the ability to soar over the Duomo in Florence (my absolute favorite city) was a little thrilling.

CoSpaces EDU is brilliant and I spent a couple of hours on that site.  I highly recommend taking a walk through the AR/VR museum.  Using your arrow keys, you can walk through as though it was a real museum with ambient chatter and footsteps and other attendees, and learn about the history of AR/VR. 

There's also a Presidents museum which is a short, but interesting virtual jaunt.

Also within CoSpaces EDU is a Storytelling and Literature page that shows the ways in which an educator can break down stories and scenes into an easily accessible visual format.  They have a Romeo and Juliet scene recreation space which is pretty great in its simplicity. A visual learner would have no trouble assimilating the story, plot and characters into a comprehensive understanding of the play.

I added COSpaces EDU to my iPhone apps too :) !

Qlone 3D is an "all-in-one tool for 3D scanning & AR."  With it you can scan real objects, using your phone's camera, and export the results to 3D files and printers.  This was a bit beyond my reach as I was not yet prepared to download the app and print a scan mat, etc. but I did watch their tutorial on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XkTaCOQ_OjI

While it looked very cool and I could imagine a lot of applications for this technology, the reviews I read were very lukewarm.  Most people felt it "had potential" but wasn't well thought-out. This may be one of the two platforms I use for next week's blog to make that determination for myself.

JigSpace looks terrific for creating 3D models and I can definitely see where this would have application in STEM projects and the ability to build machines and inventions and share them with a class. It looks pretty streamlined as far as being able to take obj (standard 3D image format) files and others like it and manipulate them.  It doesn't have audio or text-to-speech features which is unfortunate. 

Years ago, when my kids were first slapping at the controls for Jumping Flash and Crash Bandicoot, I wondered where technology might go with interaction and manipulation of images and its potential uses in all aspects of our lives from education to medicine to the environment, to space.  The AR/VR sites that I perused were just a scratching of the surface of what is possible, what's already out there and where it is heading tomorrow. 

~ J