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Augmented Reality Tourism 87

Posted by michael from the we-have-the-technology dept.
pershino writes "Augmented reality is gaining real world application to take us backwards. The BBC has a story about a European Union-funded project providing tourists with computer-augmented versions of archaeological attractions like Pompeii."
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Augmented Reality Tourism More

Augmented Reality Tourism

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  • How long to the augmented Mars experience? (Score:5, Funny)

    by syrinje ( 781614 ) on Sunday October 31, 2004 @04:42PM (#10680895)
    And more importantly - will my stupendously Total Recall memory of the vacation be rudely disturbed by strange freaky humanoid maritian colonisers trying to kill me in the subterranean hum of the power plant?

  • Character responses ... (Score:5, Funny)

    by isometrick ( 817436 ) on Sunday October 31, 2004 @04:43PM (#10680898)
    "Pompeii would be peopled by computer-generated characters"

    How would they respond to you running around saying "YOU'RE ALL GOING TO DIE IN A FIERY DEATH!!!!"

  • am I the only one... (Score:5, Funny)

    by nbert ( 785663 ) on Sunday October 31, 2004 @04:44PM (#10680906) Homepage Journal
    who read "Augmented Reality Terrorism" the first time? Note for next time: Read the headline twice before reading the article. Saves you from a lot of confusion...
  • Imaging you go to the Rome and see the whole Colosseum like it was in the movie Gladiator, or the Bamiyan Buddhas in Afghanistan.

    This could also be a way for our future generation to see our world.
  • I've already been an augmented reality [shroomery.org] tourist [visitamsterdam.nl].
  • Augmented reality is definitely cool, and it has a lot of useful applications. However, I don't think it's quite the same as visiting a place for yourself. That's not possible with Pompeii, but I don't think "Augmented Reality Tourism" can approach the majesty of seeing the Niagra Falls or the Pyramids at Giza for yourself. There's just something special about seeing things in real life.
    • Definitely true right now ... but ideally the technology will be able to directly stimulate your senses someday. Then it might be hard to tell the difference.
    • *There's just something special about seeing things in real life.*

      no shit, that doesn't mean though that documentaries are useless.

      it's just the same thing.. but up to the max... besides.. would you like to die a scorching death in a volcano?

    • Re:AR isn't quite the same (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      but I don't think "Augmented Reality Tourism" can approach the majesty of seeing the Niagra Falls or the Pyramids at Giza for yourself ...if only there were a way to see the pyramids of giza without being pestered every five seconds with shouts of "hey mister!" from people trying to sell you things you don't want. i don't know about niagra falls though. i've never been there, but i usually tell everyone that i met a girl there.

      • Re:AR isn't quite the same (Score:1, Funny)

        by Anonymous Coward
        i don't know about niagra falls though. i've never been there, i usually tell everyone that i met a girl there.

        Every slashdotter does. Unfortunately it's all the same girl. She gets around...like a record.
    • but isn't this exactly what they want to do? To visit the place and wear some VR display which augments the parts which aren't there anymore? Walking through the remains of Pompeii *seing* what the city used to be like sounds like a great idea to me.

      Might look even more disgusting than those audio guide headphones, but I think it's still a good tradeoff ;)
    • But you cannot go everywhere. There are 100s of locations i really would like to see sometimes, but i have neiter the time nor the money (flight, hotel, vacation,ect). Just plugging in after work for a hour or two isnt the real thing, but much better than tv-reports or books... (nothing against books, but the whole "imagination" thing is prone to backfire in that case :) )

    • AR is not VR. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by twitter ( 104583 ) on Sunday October 31, 2004 @06:01PM (#10681357) Homepage Journal
      Augmented reality ... I don't think it's quite the same as visiting a place for yourself.

      RTFA and think please.

      AR is stuff superimposed on reality at the site. If you want the magisty of the site on it's own, take your headset off.

      AR's greatest potential is in historical conservation. It should go far to eliminate botched "restorations" as any number of interpretations can be imaged over the actual object without ever touching it. That's very cool.

      AR's greatest potential revenue will be in historical gaming. People already pay for laser tag and paintball. AR can take them to any battle field, give them grisly wounds and other fun effects. Others might prefer other illusions all will be willing to pay for them and many more will be willing to share what they make without charge.

    • However, I don't think it's quite the same as visiting a place for yourself. you are visiting the place. the ar equipment adds virtual people to the scene you are looking at. I saw some of their presentations in siggraph, it looks pretty cool. Realtime ar, human animation, hair and cloth simulation.

  • Great (Score:5, Funny)

    by Sipos ( 731917 ) on Sunday October 31, 2004 @04:47PM (#10680919)
    so now I can spend my holidays with computers too.

  • Games section? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by jamesgray ( 824292 )
    Interesting how this was put in the games section. Since when was tourism/archaeology a game? Not to mention it make my eyes hurt, ha. Cheers, james

  • Pompeii (Score:4, Funny)

    by GrAfFiT ( 802657 ) on Sunday October 31, 2004 @04:48PM (#10680925) Homepage
    Everyone knows there are several brothels in Pompeii... right ?
    Pompeii would be peopled by computer-generated characters
    That would be cool, for sure. More interesting, immediately.

  • Does not seem very appealing (Score:3, Funny)

    by Timesprout ( 579035 ) on Sunday October 31, 2004 @04:48PM (#10680926)
    computer-augmented versions of archaeological attractions like Pompeii

    What do they do, lock you in a server room running 10,000 AMD chips spiked at 100% usage and wait for your skin to start melting?

  • Technology behind Augmented Reality (Score:5, Informative)

    by FiReaNGeL ( 312636 ) <.moc.liamtoh. .ta. .l3gnaerif.> on Sunday October 31, 2004 @04:48PM (#10680929) Homepage
    The tech behind this amazing stuff is from 2d3 [2d3.com], a UK company. Among others, WETA digitals (responsible for the LOTR CG effects) used their camera-tracking soft for post-production.

    Holodeck, closer than we think?

  • Virtual Life next? (Score:3, Funny)

    by mikewas ( 119762 ) <(moc.liamg) (ta) (rehcsaw)> on Sunday October 31, 2004 @04:50PM (#10680939) Homepage
    Why limit yourself to archeological digs. Have an entire Virtual Life. Make everything better -- all day -- and all night.

    Where do I sign up?

  • I think we've all been waiting for good VR tech to start becomming a reality, but what would people most like to use it for?

    I can think of a few ways... Tour of the Playboy Mansion
    Tour of the Penthouse Photo studios
    Tour of the Dallas Cheerleader locker room (or any Cheerleader's locker-room..)

  • Virtual Robotic Tourism (Score:3, Interesting)

    by HRbnjR ( 12398 ) <chris@hubick.com> on Sunday October 31, 2004 @04:52PM (#10680955) Homepage
    I want to rent a robot in a far away place which I can control over the internet from home. It would let me drive around the attraction, and have a video camera I could aim (direction, raise, lower), along with a microphone. The software client for my computer would not only display the video/audio stream, but show an interactive GPS map of where I (my robot) am, and provide context sensitive supplementary text, audio, and video information akin to a tour guide - especially at any places my robot could not maneuver. I could even be able to interact with people in these places, and possibly so far as to purchase items that would be shipped to me. I would like to be able to rent such a robot (by the hour) at any major tourist attraction around the world (ie, Pyramids). And, of course, the rates would be really reasonable :P
    • ...and you're robot won't need to pay tickets!
    • Then I can take my virtual tourist bot and use it to RAIN FIREY DEATH TO THE MEATBAGS.

      Yeah, great idea, but we're not even socially responsible to each other yet. When we are anonymous, we're even worse. Imagine if we were anonymous *and* could interact with objects in another place?
    • OK, if you were talking about remote vacations to places that people can not go, than I could understand, but I have not heard of any souvenir shops on Mars, so I don't think that is what you had in mind. Perhaps you should consider taking a real vacation. It sounds like you need it.

      On another note, can you imagine what it would be like when a bunch of /.ers end up on remote vacations like this? The queue at popular tourists spots is going to end up looking like a scene from Battlebots.
  • As Westerners, we can face history and understand its truth. So, we would not shun it.

    The same cannot be said of, say, the Chinese. The reality of 1895 Shanghai is that, under Western domination, the city prospered. For the first time in its history, people enjoyed codified laws that police fairly enforced. The rest of China was a pig sty: warlords controlled vast stretches of land and ruled by whim.

    If we created an accurate virtual reality of 1895 Shanghai, the Chinese would be up in arms, crying "

  • Augmented reality should be able to turn the love doll lying in your closet into a real woman!

  • An interesting research project... (Score:5, Funny)

    by suso ( 153703 ) on Sunday October 31, 2004 @05:19PM (#10681076) Journal
    You know, some day someone is going to do their PhD thesis on what types of words and stories are most likely to attract the attention of geeks.

    "Augmented Reality"

    *click*

    *webserver breaks*

  • Fashionable (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Lord_Dweomer ( 648696 ) on Sunday October 31, 2004 @05:27PM (#10681128) Homepage
    This is what will make Augmented Reality devices mainstream.

    Once cellphones became compact, well-designed and a social accessory, they went mainstream much faster than they could have if they weren't.

    People are much more accepting of new technology when it appeals to their eye, and looks like something they'd be familiar with. Luckily glasses are familiar, and thin headsets are starting to be what with bluetooth earpieces and stuff like that.

    We just need someone like Apple to come along and come out with something people will want to buy. Once the consumer money is behind it, it could take off in ways the MIT Media Lab never invisioned.

  • The Implications of AR Tourism (Score:3, Informative)

    by Spellunk ( 777915 ) on Sunday October 31, 2004 @05:36PM (#10681170)
    Not only does this appear to greatly help tourism by drawing children (and their parents) to sites that may have been dying from a worldwide slump in tourism.

    My first thought when reading the article was "they are going to make great interactive video games with this".

    Good job posting this in the games section.

  • Make way for the AR Future (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Billy the Mountain ( 225541 ) on Sunday October 31, 2004 @05:36PM (#10681174) Journal
    While tourism might be cool, I think there's a place for AR in our daily lives. If AR were accessible right now, I'd no longer have to decide whether to exercise or play GTA. I think it would be neat if the First Person Shooter could be integrated with a sophisticated body movement sensor and HUD so that you could get your daily 10,000 steps in and, at the same time, boost your score.

    BTM

  • Interesting Extension Idea (Score:3, Interesting)

    by fwitness ( 195565 ) on Sunday October 31, 2004 @05:40PM (#10681198)
    Actually, I remember seeing a virtual reality tour [fileplanet.com] of the famous Notre Dame [wikipedia.org]. We're seeing this sort of thing more and more, mostly with QuickTimeVR.

    As with most of these technologies, I think companies are mostly still a little leary because the average computer is still a little bit underpowered. I'm a tech guy and I still use my 700mhz laptop for daily stuff.
    • I would love to see someone continuing and improving on the idea created with that VR tour of Notre Dame. While that building's digital version had a few flaws (and a few 2D objects masquerading as 3D), it was good enough to give me a severe case of deja vu when I visited the real thing in Paris a few years ago.

      A couple of weeks before I left, I explored the cathedral thoroughly using that software, then was able to walk directly to different parts of the real cathedral and see what I expected to see. It

      • Think about a particularly well known deathmatch level from your favorite FPS shooter game -- if the place were real, could you find your way around it quickly for the "first" time? Would you know where to hide? Be able to pick out good sniper holes?

        Oh great, now you've got me thinking about mp_dawnville [callofdutyelement.com] and wondering what it'd be like in real life. :-P

        And yes, I think I would know of all the good spots to hang out with a kar98k.

  • Rats ! (Score:3, Informative)

    by janoc ( 699997 ) on Sunday October 31, 2004 @05:41PM (#10681206)
    OK, I am a sysadmin of VRlab and the Lifeplus project you are Slashdotting is on my server. How nice :)

    BTW, Lifeplus is finished already, check out the other projects on our web site.

    Regards,

    Jan

  • BTW, ligwww.epfl.ch is obsolete link for several years. The canonical reference is: http://vrlab.epfl.ch/Projects/lifeplus.html

    Jan

  • Singapore Augmented Reality (Score:3, Interesting)

    by mumblestheclown ( 569987 ) on Sunday October 31, 2004 @06:19PM (#10681469)
    One of Singapore's main historic sites is a series of command bunkers called the "Battle Box." from which the british conducted the "defense" of the city against the Japanese invasion. Being a bit of a World War 2 buff, I paid for the tour. The Battle Box tour was high tech augmented reality - a series of high tech CG stuff and less high tech animatronic whatnots turned what might otherwise be seen as a dull series of bunkers into a living experience.

    It was a great idea done at a high budget level. Unfortunately, the underlying story of the defense of Singapore as far as the battle box is concerned is dull ("they've captured our water supply.. hmm.. maybe we should have defended it.. oh well, we're hosed.. i concur.. let's surrender"), but the experience really opened my eyes to the possibilities of this sort of thing.

  • I hope a virtual Pompeii would be better than it is in person. Having just visited it, I can say don't waste your time. Everything of interest has been removed and relocated to Naples. This is just about all the Italians can do in terms of national treasure protection. Every great monument in the country has been vandalized terribly. You can find spray paint all over the place. If your in the area I hear Hurculeum[sp?] is much better. I personally haven't checked it out. Also, there are boats that are alwa
    • I've been to Pompeii too, and what I would say would be the best use of augmented reality would be to put back the walls and roofs and such of all the buildings. I wouldn't want it to be photorealistic so that you couldn't tell which parts were real, but I would want something like a wireframe outline, or a semi-transparent thing.

      By the way, in that area of Italy the places I enjoyed the most were the town of Sorrento, and the island of Capri. For all I know Lipardi etc. could be even better; I didn't se
      • Pompeii was just huge. It's the size of a small town. I was there for two whole days and still didn't get a chance to see everything. The first day I walked around pretty much by myself. The next day I took these girls from Canada who were staying at my hostel and sort of gave them the highlights of Pompeii. Company aside, the second day was much more interesting. The moral is, these AR/VR/3D devices could link up to GPS and show were most people have been so that in extremely large sites, if you're time is
  • ....over 30 years ago, there were movies about . [imdb.com]
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Augmented Reality vs Real Reality (Score:3, Insightful)

    by QuantumFTL ( 197300 ) * on Sunday October 31, 2004 @08:09PM (#10682001)
    I know that Augmented Reality has many places where it can shine - on the battlefield, on the operating table, etc... but doesn't it seem like much of these functionalities simply distract from *REAL* reality? Does it say something about the attention span of this generation that we want to be bombarded with facts everywhere we go, like "Pop Up Video"?

    I mean really, isn't the point of being outside to *GET AWAY* from computers and technology, and experience the real world? I mean, I love cyber space, and not that this isn't a cool technology, but really...
    • I mean really, isn't the point of being outside to *GET AWAY* from computers and technology, and experience the real world?
      No, it isn't, thanks for asking. Unless you have a bad case of computer addiction and a prescription from doctor to go outside and not touch any, going outside doesn't mean going away from computers and technology.

      And in case you are sincerely curious about the reasons to go outside, here is a small incomplete list:

      To breath fresh air, especially in mountains, in the forest or around

  • So when I die in the AR, does my physical body die as well? That would make Pompeii kinda scary, don't you think?

    Heck, it happened in The Matrix, why not reality? :)

  • A simpler solution... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) on Monday November 01, 2004 @07:19AM (#10684486) Homepage Journal
    I'm not too bothered about augmented reality, what I'd really like to see is a kind of "map wiki".

    Imagine being able to walk around a city, with a map on your palmtop/phone controlled by GPS. Interesting sites are marked out, and anyone can add their own notes. Instead of virtual tour guides, there could be Wikipedia style entries which IMHO would be much more interesting and less annoying.
    • Okay, now add augmented reality. :)

      Imagine a "virtual map" when you look down, that knows where you are, and filters to whatever sorts of features you're looking for, say, restaurants. And when you decide where you want to go, you get a "follow the yellow brick road" feature superimposed on the world.

      Look at my shiny thing. Is it not nifty?

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