Esquire Magazine Dec. 2009

A couple of weeks ago there was a lot of buzz around augmented reality and Esquire magazine that was dedicating coverage to AR for the December 2009 issue. AugmentPro did a complete video review on the magazine here.

Naturally, many were asking what agency took this dive into creating this AR experience for Esquire. It was reported that the NYC based agency, The Barbarian Group and the animation and design company Psyop were behind this initiative.

I immediately reached out to The Barbarian Group to find out more about the process and had the privilege of interviewing the cofounder and CEO Benjamin Palmer and asking some questions to gain more insight on their process and approach.

Benjamin Palmer  – Interview

CEO, The Barbarian Group

AugmentPro – What made Barbarian Group choose to use Augmented Reality as a base technology for the December issue of Esquire?

Benjamin Palmer CEO The Barbarian Group

Benjamin P. - It was based on a question posed to us by Esquire – how would we combine a magazine and digital content to make something more?  This is the essence of what AR is about, and the larger question was figuring out what we were going to do.

AugmentPro – Does Barbarian Group have any statistics/analytics behind the demographic of who will use augmented reality technology to its fullest?

Benjamin P. – We think the Esquire reader is a perfect audience for AR – generally well educated and likely to have a decent computer with a webcam.

AugmentPro – Has Barbarian Group developed another Augmented Reality experience or application that was received well?

Benjamin P. – No, this is our first AR project.  We’ve been interested for some time in the medium in general but we’ve been waiting for a good opportunity to do something special.

AugmentPro – How long did it take from concept to execution of the augmented reality experience for the Esquire cover?

Benjamin P. – We started on the concept in the early spring of 2009, and discussed, and then started in the summertime.  I’d say half a year of work in varying levels of intensity.

AugmentPro – What were some of the biggest challenges that Barbarian Group faces when developing the AR experience for Esquire Magazine?

Benjamin P. – There’s not much of a development environment for AR.  We’ve actually spent a lot of time developing our own software for this project and future projects (called Cinder, out sometime reasonably soon).  Until we built some tools it was very unclear how long certain things would take to create, so there was a lot of uncertainty!

AugmentPro – Is there a possibility that Barbarian Group will continue to develop AR experiences for Esquire or other magazines?

Benjamin P. – Yes there is definitely a possibility.  We haven’t started on a new project yet but we’re discussing.

AugmentPro – What other ways does Barbarian Group see Augmented Reality to be used in future marketing campaigns?

Benjamin P. – Well, there are a lot of ways to use AR in marketing, its fairly easy to do something, I think the trick is it’s hard to do well.  It takes a lot of time and money to make sure the production value is high, and finding the right client is key to making it work as a project.

whiteapp.com

Recently in my search for new and relevant augmented reality use cases, I began to search for white label uses of augmented reality. Like many web application services it is only a matter of time before companies begin to create white label versions of respective applications. This is where whiteapp comes along.

whiteapp has a directory suite of white label mobile applications that they provide for the iPhone, Android OS and Symbian OS. Among them there is the ‘Augmented Reality’ application for the iPhone. The company behind whiteapps is putITout a London based applications development company.

I was extremely intrigued to find out more about this solution so I contacted Charles Cadbury the Founder of whiteapps and Managing Director from putItout to begin to ask some questions to discover what is the strategy and direction of their current white label AR application.

Charles Cadbury – Founder whiteapps.com Interview

AugmentPro – I see that your company Pit It Out is a London based digital development company. Can you tell me a bit more about your company and client base?

Charles Cadbury - Founder whiteapp.com

Charles C - Its putITout.  We set up 3 years ago to fill a skills gap in the London market.  Freelance web developers were charging a great premium for their services and often took a lot of management time in order to get jobs produced to spec.  Our offering centers around project managed development resource (we have grown our own team in Lahore, Pakistan) and manage all projects through a team of project managers and account managers in Russell Square in London.

Our clients tend to be mid sized creative and marketing agencies.  We typically build large, dynamic, websites, Facebook applications and bespoke CMS solutions.  From March this year we started to offer mobile application build to our client base, using a strong network of developers and mobile usability experts.

AugmentPro – What made you decide to launch whiteapp.com?

Charles C – Advertising agencies were coming to us time and time again as they were either being asked for, or wanted to offer applications to their clients.  The cost of designing and building these applications from scratch was proving too expensive for a majority of clients.  The global economic meltdown didn’t help at all…

At the same time I was meeting more and more developers who had built applications, pouring vast amount of sweat and coffee over learning the Apple SDK and not receiving adequate commercial recompense by monetizing through the app store.

whiteapp was a way to offer agencies a “shopping list” of applications they could browse and purchase, we could simply re-skin or make small alterations to these apps in a short period at a far lower cost than bespoke development.  At the same time we shared any money we generated with the developer who created the application which in the most part far exceeded the money they had made through selling the app through the app store.

AugmentPro – whiteapp seems to have a suite of mobile white label applications. Which ones appear to be the popular ones so far with agencies and clients?

Charles C – Due to an October launch the Advent calendar has been the most popular application and used as a simple brand asset for branding campaigns.  The Augmented reality application has come a close second as its an exceedingly hot topic right now and at the right price is a great PR tool to gain column inches and deliver a great experience to the user.

AugmentPro – You appear to currently have one Augmented Reality white label application. Can you please briefly describe its core features?

Charles C – It’s a “finder” application.  It takes geographic locations from a database (held locally or in the cloud) and overlays these data points on the real time video feed from the iPhone’s camera.  If the user does not have an iPhone 3Gs or holds a 3Gs flat the data points are shown as a google maps mashup, giving route finding functionality. Different tabs can be added and managed through a web based CMS that can overlay different datasets on the video feed.  Any level of additional functionality can be added to this application depending on the client’s requirements but starting from an existing product saves production time and subsequently cost.

Why re-invent the wheel – people love it!.

Download complete Augmented Reality white label application Fact Sheet here

AugmentPro – Currently it appears to only support the iPhone 3Gs. Do you have in plan to support the Android and/or other mobile OS’s?

Charles C – We are currently working with an Android developer and hope to list an Android Augmented Reality whiteapp in January 2010.  We are also working on a pitch for a bespoke build of a symbian Augmented reality product that we would like to offer as a whiteapp.  Hopefully this will come off and we will be able to offer that from May 2010.

AugmentPro – From a white label AR standpoint, what are your timeline estimates in order to deliver an AR white label app from initial conversation to final launch?

Charles C – If you hold the dataset, do not mind it being hosted within the application and have all the creative assets to hand we could turn this around within a week.  Usually there are a few iterations of design and bespoke functionality that need to be ironed out and the process can take 2-3 weeks before we submit to the app store.

AugmentPro – Do you have in plan to launch other Augmented Reality white label applications? I would love to see one that allows you to instantly generate a Marker, select from a gallery of predefined elements, then to generate an AR browser app. Is this wishful thinking?

As and when developers create Augmented Reality applications we are more than happy to list and market them  on whiteapp.  So hopefully your readership has this in development and we can all live happily ever after.

Matt Szymczyk Zugara CEO

One of the many augmented reality applications that have created a lot of buzz this past week has been the Fashionista Augmented Reality App by Tobi.com. AugmentPro covered this exciting use case a couple of days ago in our Fashionista Review.

To better understand this application I went directly to the source company behind the development and integration of this application. Zugara is an interactive marketing agency focused on emerging technologies. Matthew Szymczyk is the CEO of Zugara and I asked him to help us all understand this fantastic real world case study on how they effectively used augmented reality to apply to a consumer retail website.

Zugara CEO Matt Symczyk – Interview

Zugara.com

AugmentPro – As the CEO of Zugara, can you please give a short summary of Zugara as an interactive marketing agency?

Matt S – Zugara is an interactive marketing agency focused on emerging media and technology.  The core areas we focus on are Interactive Video, Social Media, Mobile Marketing and Website/Application Development.  We are also working quite a bit with Augmented Reality through creation of Flash-based proprietary technologies that are the foundation for our AR applications.  These technologies are licensable and have SDK’s that will allow developers to create advanced Flash-based AR executions.

AugmentPro -  What made Zugara choose to use Augmented Reality as a base technology for an application?

Matt S – Augmented Reality allows you to integrate information into a live video stream.  When we were initially looking at creating a unique online shopping experience, Augmented Reality first came to mind.  But, we also knew that usability would be important given the barriers already present with Augmented Reality (i.e. needing a webcam, printing a marker).  So, we felt by creating Flash-based Augmented Reality technologies that we were at least cutting out one barrier for the user – having to download software or install a plug-in to view.  Flash-based Augmented Reality is the reason why you’ve seen AR exploding on to the scene as of late.

AugmentPro - Does Zugara have any statistics behind the demographic of who will use augmented reality technology to its fullest?

Matt S – We are still compiling data on the best demographic target for use of AR, but we do know that currently 40% of Facebook Video uploads are via webcam.  Since we deal quite a bit (on the marketing side) with Gen X and Gen Y, we are used to creating emerging media and technologies for these demographics.  With the continued market saturation of webcams and Gen Y’s continued adoption of livestreaming and webcam based video, it seems only natural that Augmented Reality would also be a technology that is quickly adopted by this generation.

AugmentPro – Back in June 2009 Zugara introduced the Augmented Reality Dressing Room.How did brands react? Did Zugara get a lot of interest for the application?

Matt S – We had quite a bit of positive feedback and interest on the Webcam Social Shopper (Augmented Reality Dressing Room) when it was released back in June.  I think most people were surprised to see a utility based AR application as those seem to be very few and far between right now.  Social Media Integration and Utility were 2 key components of the Webcam Social Shopper and this allowed people to see how these emerging technologies could be integrated together and used effectively in an online retail experience.  Even though this application has been called a virtual dressing room or fitting room, it’s more about replicating the offline shopping experience when you’re at the rack, holding apparel up to yourself, and soliciting feedback from friends or family.

AugmentPro - Tobi.com seems to be the first company/brand that has adopted your application, are there other companies or case studies that you are allowed to share that will be leveraging your application?

Matt S – Tobi.com is the first brand to use the Webcam Social Shopper and I think over the next 3-4 months you’ll also see a few other brands using it as well.  Unfortunately, I cannot get into details about that at the moment.

AugmentPro - What are some of the best features of the Fashionista application?

Tobi.com - Fashionista Augmented Reality App

Matt S – I think we’re most proud of the ZugMO motion capture technology and Social Media integration.  When you see the person step back to control their “Augmented Shopping Experience”, that was a technology we created internally after going through initial usability tests.  We felt it was more natural to step away from the computer to try things on, so spent time creating the tech to do it.  We’re also happy with how the Facebook integration turned out which allows the shopper to post images of their shopping experience directly into their stream.

AugmentPro - What future features are in development for this application?

Matt S – We have a new technology that we actually just debuted in Europe called ZugSTAR.  This is short for Zugara Streaming Augmented Reality.  What this allows is for multiple people to use Flash-based Augmented Reality in real-time.  For instance, with ZugSTAR integrated into an application like Fashionista, this would allow a mother in New York to shop online with her daughter in Los Angeles.  They would both be able to see the other’s augmented experience to provide instantaneous feedback.  We’re pretty excited about this tech and it’s other applications (for other industries).  We even did a quick blog post to show how it would look – http://weareorganizedchaos.com/index.php/2009/11/04/zugaras-zugstar-video-conferencing-augmented-reality-a-shared-ar-experience/.

AugmentPro - Are there any other applications that Zugara will launch in the future that will leverage augmented reality?

Matt S – Please see above and keep an eye out for an official announcement in December.  We know initially people are like “Streaming Augmented Reality? So What…” But once we release some prototype examples of how ZugSTAR can be used, I think you’ll see quite a few people get excited about it.