3d illusion arts: Walyou

Walyou

Blippar Brings AR Advertising and Image Recognition to Google Glass
Zombie-Proof Pizza – Military Develops Pizza That Keeps For 3 Years!
13 Photos of a Tiny Lego Photographer Taking PIctures
Flappy Bird-Playing Robot Outsmarts Humans
Disney Movies Anywhere App Incoming!

Blippar Brings AR Advertising and Image Recognition to Google Glass

Posted: 26 Feb 2014 09:00 AM PST

Wearables were meant from the beginning to offer the means for new ways of advertising and new search methods. Blippar’s implementation of AR advertising and image recognition into Google Glass is firm proof of that.

Ambarish Mitra, the CEO of Blippar, showcased at MWC in Barcelona the app that makes all of this possible. Certainly, the idea of augmented reality advertising isn’t new, as numerous companies have already played with this technology, Cadburry and IKEA being only two examples.

Mitra explained that “Glass today can be likened to what mobile phones were in early nineties. We at Blippar anticipate that if Glass reaches a couple million users in its first year of launch, it will be a good business opportunity for us to develop in the space. We are investing in the potential of Glass.” I have to admit that the CEO of this company is right. Smart glasses are still a new thing, and people are currently only scratching the surface in terms of the applications that these wearables could have.

Blippar wouldn’t mind at all if the user base of Google Glass went beyond one million, especially since its app is used by five million people worldwide. In terms of brands and publishers, Blippar offers its AR advertising service to 750 companies, a number that will certainly grow in the future.

Besides Android, which is obviously the operating system Google Glass comes with, Blippar also works with smartphones running iOS, Blackberry OS or Windows Phone. Assuming that these operating systems showed up one day in a pair of smart glasses, it wouldn’t be difficult for Blippar to port their app to the wearables.

The demonstration that Mitra conducted at MWC also included the recognition of images, products, and even human faces. The last aspect is a bit scary, especially since Google claimed that it won’t implement face recognition into its smart glasses.

While Google Images is able to recognize pictures and can even decipher some product logos, the face recognition and AR advertising technologies that Blippar brings to the table are definitely innovative, especially in the context of smart glasses. In time, tech companies will hopefully come with even more diverse applications for wearables. I’m confident about this, as smart watches and smart glasses are only the beginning of the adventure.

Be social! Follow Walyou on Facebook and Twitter, and read more related stories about the Häagen-Dazs AR Concerto Timer and Microsoft IllumiRoom.

Zombie-Proof Pizza – Military Develops Pizza That Keeps For 3 Years!

Posted: 26 Feb 2014 06:00 AM PST

That’s all we really needed, bring the apocalypse on! The military has devised a pizza (yes, they work on that) that keeps for 3 years without refrigeration.

Imagine the following: you’re hiding in the mall with your group of survivors while the zombie apocalypse rages outside. You can’t go out to get provisions until the horde moves, right? Well, you won’t have to, because you could eat the pizza, years after it was first cooked. It turns out the US military has a formula that keeps the pizza fresh for three years without any kind of refrigeration. Now, if only we can add some Mexican food to the mix, we’ll be able to just stay there – forever.

Source: Geekologie

Be social! Follow Walyou on Facebook and Twitter, and read more related at AMC Create The Walking Dead Zombie Survival Course and U.S. Army Advises How to Handle the Zombie Apocalypse.

13 Photos of a Tiny Lego Photographer Taking PIctures

Posted: 26 Feb 2014 05:00 AM PST

All it takes to get a certain idea might be visiting a certain store. That’s what happened to Hampshire-based photographer Andrew Whyte that made him begin his Leg O'Grapher's photo series.

A simple idea, but unique and quite heart warming to see – A tiny Lego man walking around and taking photos, with Whyte behind him orchestrating and taking the photograph himself.

As Whyte told Buzzfeed:

Away from my meticulously staged night photography I'm a compulsive snapper. But quite often there's nothing cohesive about what I shoot from one day to the next and things take a while to come together. We visited the LEGO store as a family and my kids discovered a camera accessory that fits in the hand of a minifigure. I love to document everyday things and develop mini series about them. The idea of positioning the character in my daily shots just fell into place from there. For the whole year, I really never left home without the figure. But only in the same way as you never leave home without your keys or phone. That was part of why the iPhone seemed a natural candidate for taking the shots. I always had it with me, but also it allowed me to get much closer to the figure than any of my Nikon gear. By getting close to the figure, the sense of scale was distorted to make the figure seem closer to life-size. The rest just happened on a daily basis, for the most part snapping what I saw rather than chasing light, locations & ideas.

For more awesome Lego stuff, check out this Braigo budget braille printer made out of Lego

Flappy Bird-Playing Robot Outsmarts Humans

Posted: 26 Feb 2014 04:30 AM PST

Two developers from the Shaanxi province of China wanted to prove that a robot could easily outwit humans when it comes to playing the short-lived addictive smartphone game that was Flappy Bird.

After this game became a phenomenon and disappeared suddenly both from Google’s Play Store and Apple’s App Store, various machines imitating it started appearing. Still, none is as impressive as the robot designed by Liu Yang and Shi Xuekun. In fact, this project is not imitating the game, but actually playing it on a tablet.

The robot that Yang and Xuekun built is indeed fascinating because of several reasons. First of all, its developers claim to have put it together in around 4 hours. If only they had come with the idea before the game vanished… However, this stands to show that talented people can turn ideas into tangible things in a very short time. Still, it was the simplicity of the design that enabled the two developers to make this robot in just a few hours.

The second jaw-dropping detail about the Flappy Bird-playing robot is that it was made using only a webcam, the arm of an old hard drive and the tip of a stylus. Who would have thought that kicking behinds at this game required such a little investment?

Ever since Vietnamese game developer Dong Nguyen removed his Flappy Bird from Play Store and App Store, a lot of clones based on the same principle sprung up. Google and Apple proceeded to banning all the apps containing the word ‘Flappy’ in their names, but some got through: Clumsy Bird, Floppy Bird, Clever Bird, and others. It’ll be interesting to see how Apple and Google will react to these.

As Chelsea Stark from Mashable suggests, there are plenty of other mobile games that have an addictive nature, some examples including Duet Game, Bee Leader, Impossible Road and What the Frog. While these made the list of recommendations simply because they can easily cause addiction, Flappy Doge, another game suggested by Chelsea, is a straight forward clone of Nguyen’s game. The latter should get some credit for including the Doge meme.

I’m shocked that no one thought of making a Flappy Bird clone featuring the Nyan Cat. Oh, wait!

Be social! Follow Walyou on Facebook and Twitter, and read more related stories about how ridiculously expensive phones featuring Flappy Bird got after the game was removed from the app stores, and this guide on how to win at Flappy Bird, in case you can’t build a robot like the one described above.

Disney Movies Anywhere App Incoming!

Posted: 26 Feb 2014 04:00 AM PST

Disney has joined the battle for control over the digital entertainment market with their own streaming apps where users can watch over 400+ titles.

The new app released by Walt Disney Studios is called Disney Movies Anywhere, and is an Apple iOS exclusive as of right now (sorry Android users! You’ll have to wait a bit longer). The app is more than just an afterthought, and has a library which contains over 400 digital movies at launch. And not any movie! From the classics we know and love to recent smash-hits like 'Frozen', all are just a couple taps of the screen away. Also, the app can be used on a Windows or Mac computer if you prefer to use a desktop instead of a mobile device.

It is expected for the library to keep growing thanks to Disney’s many partners and recent acquisitions such as Lucasfilm, creators of the "Star Wars" movie saga.