Urban Conversion

Dec 03, 2008

A lot has a been written about augmented reality - is that really a sizable tree growing out of a chimney or has it been photoshopped? To what extent will tomorrow's urban architecture be designed to be digitally augmentable? as opposed to being inherently augmentable?

Technology is evolving to the point where LED based pocketable projectors will be bringing digital content to a surface in front of us (imagine a variation of this from Afghanistan but for a wider range of moving content). Because of its inherent immediacy - the wow effect, pocket projectors will go through its moment as the gadget de jour, but ultimately use will restricted to use due to poor lighting conditions, sub-optimal surfaces on which to project and unstable surfaces on which to rest the projector. They will potentially include some form of data capture like duh, a camera turning the one way flow of information a form of proximate broadcasting (data transfer via, say, LED based street lights being already feasible). Throw multiple projectors to the mix and a new medium is born.

Related: a solid piece by Kevin Kelly in the NYT on screen literacy (& ta Sara for the pointer).

Photo from a day on the back of a bike in Bangkok.

Location:
 Thailand »  Bangkok Keywords:
 augmented reality | pocket | projectors