SmartReality: Augmented Reality+ Services+ Semantics

Due to the proliferation of smartphones, Augmented Reality applications have become more widespread nowadays. Augmented Reality browsers have especially enjoyed wide popularity within these applications. The physical environment could be extended by location-aware additional information using these browsers. At present, typically a specific data source is used by the current Augmented Reality browsers, even if there is an enormous amount of available data sources. The Semantic Web could help to bridge this problem. The goal of this work is to combine Augmented Reality and Semantic Web technologies in order to enhance the existing mobile Augmented Reality browsers using Semantic Web technologies. For this purpose, we utilize the advantages of the Semantic Web technologies such as data integration, unified data model as well as publicly available semantic data sources, among other things.

2017

In this paper, we present a new approach to building large-scale ubiquitous augmented reality (AR) applications. Instead of fixed AR content, presented on specific places or objects, we propose the concept of a semantic network of distributed AR services contributed by different providers. These services have different roles and offer different content and functionality, but the synergy offered by such a diverse network of services opens new fields of application for AR systems. The services in our approach are modeled using well-established standards from the domain of business process modeling, but they are additionally annotated using semantic descriptions of the role and properties of particular services and their relationships, allowing meaningful selection of dynamic exploration paths by users with different interests, constraints and privileges. An indispensable element of such heterogeneous AR systems is proper consideration of security and privacy issues, which are also cov...

Owing to the remarkable advancement of smartphones, Augmented Reality applications have become part of everyday life. Augmented Reality browsers are the most commonly used among these applications. The users can search and display interesting places from the physical environment surrounding them by means of these browsers. Some of the most popular AR browsers use only one data source and the openly available datasets are not used. In contrast, the main objective of Linked Open Data community project is to link knowledge from different data sources. This pursuit makes it easier to retrieval information, among others. In this paper, an Augmented Reality browser was presented. Information derived from Linked Open Data was used by the browser as data source. Due to this, the system is able to handle more data sources.

ARCAMA-3D (Augmented Reality for Context Aware Mobile Applications with 3D) is a mobile platform that allows us to overlay a 3D representation of the surroundings with augmented reality objects. In this paper, we show how these 3D objects, which are overlaid on the real view captured by the camera of the mobile device, are coupled with the Linked Open Data (LOD) cloud. With this approach, the data aggregation for a mobile augmented reality system is provided using the interconnected knowledge bases on the Web. This offers the possibility to enrich our 3D objects with structured information on the cloud. The objects that act as an augmented reality interface are used to provide an interactive access to these information. This approach provides an opportunity for people who publish information on the LOD cloud to interlink their data with 3D urban models. In order to achieve this, we propose an extensible data model that takes into account the temporal evolution of real world entities (such as buildings, monuments, etc.) and we publish our 3D models using this data model.

The authors combine building information modeling (BIM) data with ambient information from devices deployed in smart buildings. Their Android-based application can then offer environmental building information integrated with BIM data in an augmented and virtual reality environment. Today's buildings are equipped with various types of sensor nodes—either wired or wirelessly connected to a home or building network—for monitoring and management purposes. These devices provide ambient information about environmental and energy-related parameters to increase awareness in building occupants and managers, and to facilitate feedback actions or plan interventions. Nevertheless, how to enable interoperability across devices adopting heterogeneous communication protocols or standards is the object of intensive research. Service-oriented middleware technologies attempt to address this issue. 1,2 In the context of smart buildings, effectively engaging users and exploiting so much potential information requires contextualizing physical data from sensors by combining it with other types of ambient information, such as building characteristics, topology, and infrastructures. To this end, building and energy managers can exploit building information modeling (BIM), 3 a methodology that provides an accurate virtual model, usually in 3D, of a building and its infrastructures. This model is created, updated, and consulted during the design, development, and management of the building itself. Here, we present a methodology and an associated Android-based mobile application that integrates sensor data with building models, allowing end users (that is, technicians and building and energy managers) to navigate in a virtual or augmented building environment and access context-related physical environmental parameters such as temperature, humidity, and energy consumption. The values of these parameters can be easily correlated with other building characteristics and infrastructural properties, such as gas, electricity, or heating networks. Our methodology leverages a distributed software architecture composed of underlying middleware services to access sensor data in a hardware-independent way and combine it with BIM models interactively. Our work's main aims are to • collect environmental information from heterogeneous devices via a distributed software architecture; • combine BIM structural data with real-time information to improve building maintenance; • improve the visualization of such integrated information in a virtual and augmented reality environment; • move BIM from desktop computers to mobile devices by providing an innovative, portable tool for building and energy managers; • provide end users with a tool for interacting with the building to access heterogeneous data available from multiple pervasive sources; and • increase user awareness about energy consumption and environmental conditions. Augmented reality (AR) has been defined as the link between the real world and virtual reality (VR), 4 which in turn is a completely artificial environment for simulating reality. Each real object intrinsically provides a significant amount of information that sometimes is not immediately perceived by users. AR aims to make such information visible by overlapping digital reality with physical objects. The recent evolution of smart buildings provides new horizons for VR and AR application development, which could make building management easier and increase user awareness about energy consumption. Our proposed Android application exploits both AR and VR to provide building information, overcoming limits related to 2D visualization. Indeed, it presents a 3D environment in which real-time building information, coming from pervasive devices, is combined with structural and architectural data provided by BIM.

Extended Abstracts of the 2020 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

This paper introduces a nascent project aimed at exploring new avenues to support creativity, socialisation and community through smart interfaces for augment reality. Augmented reality has been so far largely conceptualised from a point of view of 'power users' seeking to support very specific applications, e.g. in training and simulation. With the availability of devices to mass market, new applications become possible, and new research problems open up. We offer a preliminary framework consisting of 2 orthogonal continua (virtual-real and human-thing) and 2 critical perspective (postphenomenology/posthumanism and cultural interface). With this poster we hope to stimulate valuable discussion and seek input from the CHI community about the challenges, opportunities, and theoretical perspectives underpinning a smart, socialised AR.

2005

Augmented reality (AR) applications use geometric models as a central component of their operation. Both rendering and interaction require a detailed knowledge of the environment and the objects to be visualized. Usually such models are created especially for a single application and provide exactly the required information. With the combination of AR and ubiquitous computing more complex requirements for such models are appearing. In this paper we describe our experimental prototypes of semantic data models for ubiquitous augmented reality applications and discuss some further research directions and approaches to such world models.

Acta Universitatis Agriculturae et Silviculturae Mendelianae Brunensis, 2013

We assume that one of the key reasons is in the difference between a standalone application and a web service. Both architectures have some advantages and disadvantages. The Standalone application (e.g. Nokia/OVI Maps) provides the required functionality. From the user point of view, main asset of this “offline” approach is network connectivity independence. However, this kind of applications must be upgraded manually. Moreover, it is hard to get any data about the application usage because it requires additional actions from the user – data are usually acquired through conventional ways, such as email or web forms.The online service such as Google Maps (including its mobile application) can offer the same functionality as the offline application. Nevertheless, a permanent connection to provider servers is necessary. This can be taken as a drawback. On the other hand, usage data collection is easier and can be done without the user intervention. The data collection provides a valuab...

Sensors

Virtual and augmented reality technologies have known an impressive market evolution due to their potential to provide immersive experiences. However, they still have significant difficulties to enable fully fledged, consumer-ready applications that can handle complex tasks such as multi-user collaboration or time-persistent experiences. In this context, CultReal is a rapid creation and deployment platform for augmented reality (AR), aiming to revitalize cultural spaces. The platform’s content management system stores a representation of the environment, together with a database of multimedia objects that can be associated with a location. The localization component fuses data from beacons and from video cameras, providing an accurate estimation of the position and orientation of the visitor’s smartphone. A mobile application running the localization component displays the augmented content, which is seamlessly integrated with the real world. The paper focuses on the series of steps...

2020

Augmented Reality is a display and interaction method of future computing. It augments digital information in real environments in text, audio, image, or video formats. Augmented reality can be more effective if supported by knowledge about human needs. Basic human needs are finite in number, and with the right methods, they are detectable or predictable. This research develops an ontology that describes the structure and relations between the elements of augmented reality, context information, and human needs, with the ultimate goal of developing a robust conceptual model. Ontology development is a knowledge-driven approach used to represent data and reasoning. This paper focuses on linking the aforementioned concepts to enable correct data representation and reasoning. The research approach, process used, and the evaluation of the ontology is presented as well.