WHAT IS AR?

On the continuum between Reality and Virtuality, there exists an area that many people are calling Mixed Reality. As a subset of Mixed Reality, Augmented Reality (AR) rests somewhat closer to Reality. Because this field is so young, the boundaries are still vague, and there are a number of experiences that can be considered Augmented Reality. The definition we are working with is as follows:

An AR experience is an experience of Reality enhanced with Virtual elements.

General Articles and References:

• The Augmented Reality Homepage
• Jim Vallino's AR Info and Links
• Jun Rekimoto's AR Links
• AR at How Stuff Works
• Scientific American Article 04/02
• Popular Science Article
• New York Times Article on Retinal Displays

Inspirational/Specifically Relevant AR Projects:

• Augmented Composer (ATR Media Information Science Labs, 2003)
• Augmented Groove (ATR, 2000)
• Collaborative Games in Augmented Reality (Institute of Computer Graphics and Algorithms at the Vienna University of Technology, 1998)
• MARE: Multiuser Augmented Reality Environment (iMAGIS, 2002)

Other AR Projects:

• MARS at Columbia
• Wearable Computing at CMU
• Studierstube Augmented Reality Project
• Hear&There, MIT
• SIGGRAPH 2002 Sketches and Applications

AR Technologies:

• Ekahau Positioning Engine
• ARToolKit