Tag: augmented reality technology

Beam Suntory has used AR technology as a part of a new smartphone based experience for customers.

Beam Suntory, the bourbon maker, has now launched a new augmented reality experience that has been designed to show its customers how its bourbon is made, in a new, interesting, and innovative way.

The company is now using the BlippAR app as a part of its “The Bourbon Revival” retail program.

This program and the augmented reality experience are available to customers at liquor stores, featuring the Knob Creek, Maker’s 46, and Basil Hayden bourbons. According to the Beam Suntory senior director of commercial marketing, Michelle Cater, “The liquor store is a saturated environment, so we need to truly stand out in order to reach new consumers and educate shoppers on bourbon.”

This augmented reality experience has been created to work with any smartphone, regardless of operating system.

Cater stated that “Based on our research, we know that new bourbon drinkers are eager to learn more about what makes bourbon unique. With augmented reality technology, we are able to engage shoppers in an immersive and interesting way.” This particular The Bourbon Revival promotion requires the BlippAR free app to be downloaded by people who wish to participate and view the AR features.

Once the app has been installed, the AR technology codes that are posted on bourbon bottles and retail displays can be scanned. The mobile app them launches the 3D content that will appear on the user’s device screen, displayed overtop of the user’s actual environment. This makes it possible for the user to be able to interact with the bottle and create hologram-like versions of recipes and cocktails that are based on the product that they have scanned.

The primary goal of this augmented reality experience is to work as an introduction for the consumer to the different bourbons from Beam Suntory. This AR technology based experience also allows users to be able to understand the history of bourbon, learn how it is made, and to know the difference between this drink and whiskey. In fact, it even provides a “Bourbon Matchmaker” feature, which matches an individual’s own flavor and drinking preferences with the bourbon that they are likely to enjoy the most.

A new Google patent reveals that AR technology is being developed, which could provide users with a map of their environment.

Late last week, a Google patent was published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, which described a type of augmented reality technology that would enable users wearing an optical head-mounted display, like Google Glass, to view information about objects in their environment within their line of sight, reported the International Business Times.

The new technology would allow for the detection and recognition of target devices.

According to the patent application, the internet and computer software giant’s patent is called “Self-Describing Three-Dimensional (3D) Object Recognition and Control Descriptors for Augmented Reality Interfaces”. The abstract of the official patent application states that the technology would “provide for the detection and recognition of target devices, by a mobile computing device, within a pre-defined local environment.”

In essence, what this means, according to the patent, is that the technology would provide users with details about the items that exist within their environment. For instance, this could include finding out the width and height of certain objects, such as tables or chairs, via augmented reality, as well as give users a map of the room in which they are present.

This new patent may be good news for the future of Google Glass.

If this technology actually worked, in theory, it would be like having robot vision; something like the point of view that is commonly used in films to show what a robot sees as it analyzes its environment. More specifically, if a Google Glass device was equipped with this technology, it would have the potential to provide users with all the details they want to know about a certain object in a room, just by looking at it.

That being said, as exciting as this technology sounds, it is unlikely that it will give “Terminator”, “Robocop” or “Iron Man” vision to Google Glass users in the future. Right now, it’s still far too early to tell what will eventually be developed. After all, Google’s latest patent application only provides a glimpse of what the company is thinking. It doesn’t even guarantee that the product will ever reach commercialization.